Endurance Base Training: USA Cycling Course

Learn how to guide your athletes through a smart, sustainable base season—and lay the aerobic foundation for stronger performance, season after season.

This online course, “Base Training,” shows you how to pinpoint an athlete’s aerobic threshold using heart rate and power data, structure effective long, slow distance (LSD) rides, and build weekly base training plans that balance endurance, strength, and recovery.

Whether your athletes have all day to train or just a few hours a week, you’ll learn how to optimize every ride, plan smarter base weeks, and get them to race season strong—not overcooked.

You’ll master how to:

• How to optimize central conditioning and peripheral adaptations by dialing in the right intensity at the right times.
• Analyze advanced metrics like cardiovascular drift, intensity distribution, and durability markers to monitor athlete progress and avoid “junk miles.”
• Design base training weeks that work best—with the right blend of low-intensity volume, strategic strength work, and just enough threshold training to maximize gains without triggering early-season burnout.
• Convince skeptical athletes that going slower now will make them faster later—using data, science, and simple analogies that click.

If you’ve ever struggled to plan base season for athletes with limited time, confused goals, or a tendency to push too hard too soon, this course will show you a better way—backed by science and experience from coaches who’ve been there. Let base training be your secret weapon. Help your athletes go slow now to get faster later.

How to Enroll

All USA Cycling courses are offered exclusively through USA Cycling’s online learning management system at learn.usacycling.org.

Questions? Contact Suzy Sanchez, Director of DEI and Membership Programs, at ssanchez@usacycling.org.