What you need to know when embarking on cycling tours

Finally, the dream comes true - you acquire an iron two-wheeled friend. To quickly move around the city, without getting stuck in traffic jams, leaving for a bike trip or simply for the bosom of nature. But before you go to the fields, it does not hurt to find out how to use the newly purchased vehicle so that each trip is useful and enjoyable. Choosing the right saddle
Correctly matched saddle is one of the main points for getting joy from riding. Firstly, if you have a general-purpose bicycle, and not a special female model, then the saddle can be elongated and narrow for you, because usually it is designed for young men. All, of course, individually and depends on the features of the structure of the pelvis, but in general for girls are created shorter and broader options, the form of which is better suited anatomically. So grope for the most comfortable model for you.

And yet, contrary to the desired (which masks under common sense), the saddle should not be too soft. If you fall into it like a feather bed, then sooner than later you will begin to rub your own soft tissues. Choose a moderately resilient seat so that the body reliably rests against it with sciatic - "sessile" - bones and weight fell on these points of support. There are saddles and with a small ergonomic notch in the center to reduce pressure on the fifth point. Try, suddenly you will be comfortable with this.

Correct landing
While walking on a city bicycle, you can sit with an almost vertical hull, when the rudder is raised above the saddle. But the more intense your race, the faster and further you want to rush, the more you should bend over, lowering the steering wheel below the seat. The body of the rider who flies along the track is almost horizontal.

If the great sporting goals do not loom before you, but you want to keep (and improve) your health, it is even more important to choose the correct landing height. The higher you climb, the, of course, at first scary, but in the end it's more useful. The lower - the worse the knees, and everything else is not so convenient. For example, if you do not have everything in order with your back, then you can feel how, with the pedaling of the low landing, the waist strains and stretches. If you do not have such problems yet, then they appear from this. Plus, when the knees in the bottom position are quite bent, and in the upper - almost touching the chest, it is much harder for the legs to press the pedals when climbing the hill and sharp acceleration.

How can all this be avoided? Raise the saddle to such a height that you almost straighten the leg to the end when the foot is down. Yes, yes, we understand, it's scary: you can not immediately get to the ground with both feet and slow down, if suddenly someone jumped out on the road or you need to stop suddenly. So act gradually. Start with any comfortable seat height, when you can easily sit down on a bicycle and easily jump off in case of anything. Then add a little bit, at least a couple of millimeters a week - and you will quietly but surely master it. Then it will become so convenient and easy that you will not want to go back to the previous one - an ultra-low landing. It is better to spend a lot of time picking up the height at the very beginning of the journey and with pleasure to ride for years, than in the near future to overload the waist and knee joints, get the hatred for an innocent bicycle and throw it on a balcony or mezzanine.

What is cadence and why should you know about it
For the first time, do you hear? This beautiful non-Russian word means the number of pedal turns per minute. When you relax in the park and the pedals make a full turn in one second, your cadence is 60 rpm. This is a good warm-up frequency. Gradually, you start and rotate your legs more often - most cuddles are pleasant at the level of 80-100. Athletes go further, twisting the pedals twice as fast, but you do not need to strain.

If your vehicle is equipped with a bike computer measuring this very cadence, then just look at the values. If there is no such option, then just try to do 1-1.5 turns with the pedals per second, at least exceeding this frequency.

About transitions
Suppose you got a bicycle with one star between the pedals and one on the rear wheel. Then you will always dissect in one gear, pedaling more often or less depending on your physical shape, mood and the inclination of the road.

But if the asterisks are many, and the handlebar has shift knobs, everything is much more interesting. By raising or lowering the gear, you change the distance the wheels roll with the constant cadence.

The larger the asterisk in front and the smaller on the rear wheel, the higher the gear, and you rush farther and faster. Only now it's harder to pedal. If you switch to an asterisk smaller in front and more - from behind, then pedaling will become unbearably easy, but the speed of movement will be a turtle.

These gear changes are needed just so that you can choose the right cadence for yourself on any stretch of road with different slopes. Why do you frown? When you pedal too often and easily, you tire yourself out without any benefit and pleasure, if unbearably slowly and with great effort - the knee joints are overloaded, which, I'm sure, will sometime painfully snap, reminding of yourself.

Focus on your well-being: the leg muscles are tired - turn on the gear lower, you start to choke - higher, to do less revolutions. And watch the slope of the path. Go uphill - ease the load, get down and accelerate - raise to protect your health. And the cadence.

In which mode do you ride
If to speak in general, you can drive very long or very quickly. Long and quickly will not work: lactic acid will kill muscles and you will have to collapse from a bicycle and lie on the grass until this burning sensation passes.

It's all like running. If you want, carry out low-intensity aerobic training (marathon type, for long distances in not the shortest period of time), you want - high-intensive anaerobic (like sprints - for several hundred meters, but for the minimum time). The first are useful for the heart and lungs, the latter more load the muscles.

Interval training is a combination of the first two types: a site (or a certain time) with a high cadence and a sufficiently large load is replaced by a more relaxed segment, when you lower the pedal speed and intensity, passing to a lower, easy transfer. So they alternate several times. Interval training is more fun and versatile, if you need strength, endurance, well-developed lungs, a healthy heart, and a certain harmony. But at the same time - the most difficult, greatly raise the pulse and keep it at a higher level for longer.

If you want to ride every day and not stop loving this activity, you can alternate the scheme by the days of the week. For example, Monday is sprints (short but tense stretches), Tuesday is an easy aerobic walk (journey around the neighborhood), Wednesday is intervals (alternating a small number of accelerations and easy stretches), Thursday - again an easy walk, Friday - again sprints, in general, you understand. The general rule: it is necessary to conduct a simple training between two tense, and in general, always make more easy trips in the week, and then overtrain. And remember that half-hour bike trips every day are much more useful for a figure than one three-hour ruthless arrival of a day off.