How Coach Mejdin plans training

Every training plan is a series of decisions: how hard, how long, when to rest. This page explains the principles behind those decisions at The Cyclist’s Home, and where the limits are.

It starts with you

Before the first session, Coach Mejdin wants to know your goals, your usual week, your training history and your equipment. After that, the plan is written from what you really do, not from a template.

The more he knows about how you train and how you feel, the more precise the plan becomes. A power meter or a heart-rate strap helps, but you do not need to be an expert to start.

Recovery comes before effort

Training only works if you recover from it. So before asking for effort, Coach Mejdin takes into account how tired you are, how well you sleep, how your body responded to the last few days and how you feel on the bike. When the signs say slow down, the next session becomes easier, or it becomes a rest day.

This is a sign to hold back. It is not a diagnosis.

Progress, gradually and in a healthy way

• It starts from your real recent training, empty weeks included. After a long break the plan does not trust fitness you no longer have.
• Load grows a little at a time, and more slowly when you are tired or as the years go by.
• Lighter weeks are planned on a regular basis, so your body can absorb the work.
• After a break, it restarts gently, with easy aerobic weeks before any hard work.
• Rest days are guaranteed, and so is a limit to how many training days can follow one another.

Strength, with two versions

Strength is part of the plan and is built in phases: first adaptation, then building, then maintenance. Every session has a gym version and a home version, so you do not have to say in advance where you train. Athletes under 18 do strength work only if the coach decides it is right.

Races, holidays, illness and injury

• Races: the races that matter get a proper taper so you arrive fresh. Smaller races are treated as part of training.
• Holidays: those days are kept free and the week is planned around them.
• Illness and injury: training stops, and you restart gradually when you are ready.
• A missed session is not made up. The rest of the week is rebalanced from what you did.
• A long pause: the plan waits for you and restarts with your next ride.

Where experience decides

Tools take care of the daily arithmetic and help draft the sessions, inside limits that are checked automatically. They do not replace the coach.

Coach Mejdin follows each athlete, can change or replace any session and decides what no software can: when to race, when to rest more, what to do when something does not look right. That judgement comes from experience with athletes of every level, including the national team.

What this approach does not do

• It is not a medical service and does not diagnose. If you have pain, fever or an injury, see a doctor.
• It cannot work without information from you.
• It does not promise results. It aims to make every week sensible.

Last updated: 16 October 2026.