In this issue:

Winter Opening Hours
April Specials
Team Fusion Teschner Update
Fusion Cycles on Facebook
Studio Rise Offer for Fusion Cycles Customers
Upcoming Events
Nutrition Tips – planning for performance

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Winter Opening Hours

After Easter, Fusion Cycles trading hours will be:

April Specials

Mountain Bike Racing Season has begun, so here are a few specials for the mad mountain bikers amongst you!

Orbea Alma Cup MTB

Carbon frame, Sram groupset, Fox RL fork, 4pt triangle geometry
RRP $4699
Fusion Special $4499

MTB Wheels

Mavic Cross Max ST MTB Wheels $1099 ONE SET ONLY
Mavic Cross Trails MTB Wheels $599 ONE SET ONLY
Maxxis wire bead MTB Tyres $39.95 each

April Bike Review - Orbea Diem Blue

The full carbon Diem Blue is the performance flat bar commuting bike. The ultra light, highly equipped Diem runs Ultegra, Zeus carbon flat bar and seat post with Mavic Aksium race wheels. A work of performance art!  RRP $3499

Team Fusion Teschner Update

The Mooloolaba Grand Prix Criterium on 29 March saw Fusion Teschner podium with a 3rd (Adrian Booth) after a fantastic breakaway early in the race that held right through to the end.  Team Fusion Teschner also placed 2nd (Peter Thompson) and 3rd (Matt Wood) overall at the Crestmead Sizzling Summer Series.  Well done team!

Fusion Cycles on Facebook
Fusion Cycles is now on Facebook! Look for the Fusion Cycles group for news on events, group rides and social gatherings.  Click here for the link. 

Studio Rise - Improve You Fitness for Group Rides

Are you looking to improve your fitness to keep up with group rides or be able to ride for longer?  With the weather getting colder and the mornings darker, try an indoor spin class to get in those extra sessions. 

In a 45-60minute format, a spin can give you that little bit extra in fitness.  With no rolling, traffic lights or drafting from a pack, the class is all work, utilizing interval training and resistance to get an individual workout that improves your cardio vascular fitness, leg strength and overall endurance. 

In a comfortable environment with music and an instructor to motivate you through the ride, Studio Rise are one of the premiere spin studios in Brisbane.  Studio Rise classes allow you to monitor heart rate, calorie expenditure, watt output and distance traveled.  Studio Rise is located in Newstead.  For times and bookings contact Studio Rise on (07)3162 3231 or check out the website www.studiorise.com.au

Studio Rise is offering Fusion Cycles customers a 50% discount on classes when you bring a friend.  Just show your Central Fusion card when you arrive.

Nutrition Tips - Planning for Performance

Many athletes think that if they have a healthy diet then they are doing enough to meet their nutritional requirements.  But most are missing out on maximising their intake to maximise performance.  Good nutrition like any training takes planning and organisation. Nutrition like training needs to be periodised so that the goals of the nutrition plan follow the same goals as the training cycle.  For the recreational or advanced cyclist this may be broken into 3 phases, Weight loss (base phase), Fuelling phase (Interval and High intensity training phase) and Competition phase.

Base Phase.

During this cycle of training most athlete's are trying to get back to or aiming for race/training weight.  This period usually comes after a break or at the beginning of a block of training for a specific event.  The focus during training in this phase is on maintaining a low heart rate, (E1-E2 training zones) for long periods of time. 

This is the time most athletes try and cut back on calories and focus on cutting body fat.  In the past training in a depleted state has been frowned upon and argued that without energy from carbohydrates to fuel the session it will be completed in a sub standard fashion.  Recently though it has been found that completing certain sessions in a depleted state MAY improve the cellular mechanisms for producing energy during exercise.  Basically this means that your body has more micro-machinery to produce energy during exercise.   During this phase of training, athletes are trying to cut back and often inadvertently go out on training rides in a depleted state (eg. morning training without eating anything beforehand or during).  This may not be a bad thing during this phase, it may be suitable for them to go out on longer rides without nutritional support to stress the body.  The real issue with this type of training is not allowing sufficient time between sessions to recover.

Intensity Phase.

During this phase the most important outcome of training is often speed or reproducing speed multiple times.  We know that during this phase the body is under enormous amounts of stress and to reach the intensities required and to repeat them on multiple occasions, maximum nutritional support is needed.  This is not the time to deplete or restrict.  This is the time to train the body to race.  This means that you also need to train the body to use carbohydrate during the intensity you are trying to achieve.  During this phase of training an athlete should be going on training rides and consuming carbohydrate at a rate that is suitable for the intensity and duration of the training session.  Post training, athletes should be aiming to consume a recovery snack containing protein as well as carbohydrate as soon as possible.  They should then aim to consume suitable volumes of carbohydrate prior to the next session to ensure they are fully replenished.  This will facilitate high intensity sessions and allow the athlete to recover between sessions.

Competition Phase.

During this phase athletes are focusing on competing at their max.  If all the training has been done and nutrition has been adequate the appropriate competition outcome should be achievable.  During competition many athletes have trouble maintaining body composition especially if it is a long block.  Athletes competing regularly often fail to eat enough and other athletes competing sporadically are often eating too much.  During racing, ensure you fuel the body with the appropriate amounts of carbohydrates and fluids to meet the demands of the race.  We have discussed the topic of race nutrition on previous occasions (Go back to previous newsletters for information on race nutrition.

Planning for success.

It is very hard to eat well let alone, at specific times, in specific amounts.  This level of nutrition takes planning and foresight to ensure that you are never caught out in a situation where you don't have enough nutrition to complete a session at a given intensity.  Planning is difficult and this is where most athletes fall down.  Aim to sit down one day in a training week and plan out your nutrition for that week. It is easy to keep this day the same every week for your training block as it keeps consistency in the program.   You should aim to identify those sessions that are going to need support and those times throughout the week when eating right is going to be a challenge.  An example of this may be on a Wednesday night when you are working late. It is easy to buy take away on the way home (Low quality nutrients and low quality nutrition) but this will not meet your nutrition requirements if you have a big interval session on Thursday morning.  With a little pre planning Wednesday night can be identified as a night for leftovers or frozen meals and these meals can be frozen on nights when you have leftovers or prepared on the weekend when you may have more time on your hands.  Alternatively for those individuals who are really time poor there are now company's out there that make pre-prepared meals for athletes and active individuals at a reasonable cost.

As planning can be difficult to identify what is needed and when, it is a good idea to consult a professional sports dietitian to help you in planning such a program in the same way you get a qualified coach to plan your training program. 

Greg Shaw
Australian Institute of Sport
Sports Dietitian

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