Ahead of the Tour de France, Jonas Abrahamsen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team) made headlines for something stereotypically unexpected in cycling. In preparation for this year of racing, the 28-year-old Norwegian rider gained just under 20 kilograms (more than 40 pounds)... and went on to take second in stage two of the Tour, lit up climbs as King of the Mountain, and led breakaways in the first week of racing.
Abrahamsen went from being a 132-pound climber to a 172-pound climber and sprinter. He told StickyBottle.com that in his weight gain journey, his peak power went from 900 watts to a whopping 1,500 watts. And as he gained weight, he told reporters that his body went through a “delayed puberty” where he actually grew a few centimeters and packed on muscle (and finally needed to shave).
Abrahamsen admitted that in his early career, he was focused on staying as light as possible, as many cyclists tend to do. This led to him severely under-fueling, until the nutritionist with Uno-X helped him learn to listen to his body’s hunger cues.
“The concept of power-to-weight [your functional threshold power watts divided by your weight in kilograms] has made a lot of cyclists and triathletes focus too much on lowering the weight side of that ratio to bring their number up,” says Kylee Van Horn, registered dietitian and endurance sport expert at Fly Nutrition. “But putting on more muscle can actually help you produce more power, which can raise that power-to-weight ratio in a healthier way.”
Unfortunately, many of the cyclists and triathletes she talks to who are trying to lose more weight are already under-fueling, just as Abrahamsen did. “Too often, I see people trying to do this by going into these huge caloric deficits, and a lot of the weight they’re losing is muscle,” she adds. “They want to improve power-to-weight, but it gets worse because they’re losing power as they’re losing weight.”
While weight shouldn’t be a focus for cyclists, many aim for the lowest weight they can manage, which can not only end up depressing power numbers but also lead to low energy availability and potentially long-term health problems. On the other hand, packing on more muscle (and therefore gaining weight) and fueling your body for the work you’re doing may actually be what you need to hit your peak as a cyclist.
“Especially for people who can’t easily put on weight, it’s very hard to get them out of that mindset that smaller is better,” says Ryan Thomas, head coach at the Road Cycling Academy. “A lot of the time, it’s their metabolism, but it’s also their mindset that’s keeping them at the lower weight. We tell ourselves that we can’t have the extra treat or the big dinner. But if you can change that mindset and take in the fuel you need, I think you can go from being someone who’s doing well on the bike to being someone who’s capable of putting out so much more power and being stronger in general.”
Here’s what to know about gaining weight for improved performance—and why ignoring the scale is actually the best choice for your riding.
How to Know if You Need to Gain Weight for Performance
First, get a snapshot of where you are in terms of your current fueling strategy. Cyclists who have a focus on weight tend to under-eat, which can (ironically) lead to a plateau in fat loss and an inability to put on muscle or recover from workouts and races, Van Horn says.
If you have been plateaued at a certain weight and can’t move the scale up or down, Van Horn suggests working with a registered dietitian who can help you develop a plan. Often, she’ll run tests on athletes in this situation. “For some athletes, we’ll get a resting metabolic rate test done just to make sure that they are within a healthy range,” she adds. “This can show us if their metabolism slowed significantly, which can give some indication if they’re in a chronic state of under-fueling.”
She’ll also check blood markers including an in-depth hormone and thyroid panel, which can also indicate if a person is dealing with chronic under-fueling a.k.a. Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S), which can lead to issues like fatigue, abnormal periods, increased injury risk, and even bone loss.
What to Know About Building Muscle as a Cyclist
Weight loss should rarely be the goal for any cyclist, especially if you’re training at a fairly high volume. Instead, consider swapping “weight loss” for improved body composition—and focus on putting on muscle. You may actually find that like Abrahamsen, you gain a few pounds. But that weight will be muscle, which will improve your performance on the bike.
A key factor in muscle building is getting adequate protein. A gram of protein per pound of bodyweight is the top end of daily protein consumption that Van Horn would recommend, which is not an easy feat, considering a 160-pound rider would need 160 grams of protein per day. The International Association of Athletics Federations suggests athletes consume 0.7 to 1.1 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight to maintain muscle mass, so consuming an amount within this range is a smart way to go.
To make sure you get enough of the macronutrient, Van Horn is a fan of varying your protein sources. For plant-based athletes, go for beans and lentils to increase protein intake, or even add tofu to more meals, including smoothies. Vegetarians can increase intake with Greek yogurt and eggs, and of course, omnivores can add high-quality meat, poultry, and fish to meals. If you struggle to meet protein needs, Van Horn suggests turning to protein powders on occasion.
Ideally, you aren’t eating 80 grams of protein at one meal and skimping on it the rest of the day. Make your goal breaking up your protein consumption throughout the day for maximum benefits.
Also, it’s not just protein you need to build muscle—you also need to make sure you’re getting enough total calories, which may include adding more carbohydrates and fat to fuel your body. While protein is the building block for muscle, you can’t just chug protein shakes for every meal and expect to build mountain-climbing quads. So take a look at your overall nutrition plan.
In addition to your diet, consider swapping out some of your cardio workouts for strength sessions. “It’s hard to gain weight when you’re riding more than 10 hours per week,” says Thomas.
Strength training to build muscle means lifting heavy weights for about six to eight reps and three to four sets. The key is lifting a weight that feels super challenging by the final rep or two.
Start by adding one to two short strength training sets per week, focusing on lower body exercises to build up your leg and glute muscles. (Remember to start slow—Thomas points out that if you haven’t done much strength training in the past, it can leave you feeling sore and less likely to continue doing it if you do too much, too soon!)
Thomas also adds that even your on-bike training should have more strength components. To do that, add sprints and harder efforts to your schedule, versus just doing all endurance/zone 2 volume-based training.
Putting on muscle isn’t easy or quick. From a training perspective, Van Horn notes that you’ll likely have to drop your cycling volume slightly as you add in strength training, which could mean timing your muscle-building goals with your off-season.
Working with a coach and a dietitian to create a strength training plan and ensure you’re fueling adequately is a smart way to go if you’re looking to put on significant muscle.
Why You Should Ultimately Toss the Scale
The weight part of power-to-weight really only started becoming a hot topic when online cycling platforms like Zwift started requiring it in order to calibrate your avatar’s speed on the platform. Before that, it was a metric that maybe you knew about or talked about with a coach, but you weren’t forced to reckon with it every time you hopped on the trainer.
In fact, at the height of your racing season or during heavy training, your weight will fluctuate naturally as you retain water, so you may find that the more volume you do, the more you weigh. “People get weight from water retention mixed up with body fat gain, and that can lead to a hyper-focus on weight, especially for cyclists who have a history of disordered eating or eating disorders,” Van Horn explains.
Because weight fluctuates for everyone, but especially for endurance athletes who are periodizing their racing and training, staying away from the scale as much as possible is likely better for your riding than checking in every morning.
Focus on Slow and Steady Changes
Abrahamsen is in the headlines right now for crushing the Tour de France, and because of his weight gain, and that might make it seem like he’s an overnight success story, but it was a drawn-out process to get there. It took the better part of two years for him to gain 20 kilograms (of mostly muscle), and it wasn’t a simple process.
Van Horn adds that similar to the popular wisdom that one pound of weight loss a week is healthy, a pound of weight gain per week is also the norm. “You don’t want to put on too much weight in a short period of time,” she says. (Of course, she notes that every athlete will have different needs, so it’s important to work with a dietitian if you’re hoping to change your weight by a significant amount.)
Expect Some Internal Conflict
In cycling in particular, we’ve been told for years that being lighter makes us climb better, ride faster, and improve our power output. So even if you understand that you’d like to gain some muscle to improve your overall power profile (and your health and body composition in general!), you may still struggle a bit as your quads get bigger.
“I think you can say, ‘I want to do this to help improve my performance,’ but it’s still ingrained in your mind that you need to be smaller,” says Van Horn. “You may need to work to undo all of the messaging that you’ve had up until that point where you’ve made the decision to gain weight. There’s a lot of societal pressure to be smaller in general, and especially in sport, so it can be difficult.”
She notes that as you pack on muscle, make sure that you’re not constantly trying to pull on your smallest jeans or cycling kit, especially if that feels triggering to you. And again, stay away from the scale—at least at first and especially if you’ve been a cyclist like Abrahamsen with a set “ideal weight” for years.
Even if you understand that gaining weight might help make you a stronger cyclist, the first time the number on the scale hits above that old target weight may come with some unpleasant emotions... But once you see your power start to creep up and start noticing that you’re winning town line sprints on rides with friends or effortlessly crushing the last steep meters of your local climb, you’ll realize just how powerful you’ve become. Hopefully that also teaches you that weight is just a number (and not one you need to keep in mind).
Molly writes about cycling, nutrition and training with an emphasis on bringing more women into sport. She's the author of nine books including the Shred Girls series and is the founder of Strong Girl Publishing. She co-hosts The Consummate Athlete Podcast and spends most of her free time biking and running on trails, occasionally joined by her mini-dachshund.
