Assault bike workouts for conditioning, plus a 6-week assault bike workout plan

The assault bike is the most honest machine in the gym. There's no resistance knob to hide behind: the fan pushes back exactly as hard as you push it, your arms and legs both work, and there's no coasting. Which is why most people's assault bike workout plan is "go as hard as possible until I lie on the floor", repeated whenever they feel brave.

That works, briefly. A proper plan works for longer. Below are eight assault bike workouts for conditioning, from easy aerobic rides to all-out sprints, a 6-week progression, and where the bike belongs in a week that also has running and lifting, whether you schedule it yourself or let a hybrid training app do it.

Why use an assault bike for conditioning?

Air bikes (assault bike is the common name, after one popular brand) have three things going for them:

• ›No impact. You get hard conditioning without adding pounding to legs that already run.
• ›Whole-body work. Arms push and pull while legs drive, so you can reach high heart rates without your legs alone giving out first.
• ›Self-scaling resistance. The fan's resistance rises with your effort, so the same bike works for an easy spin and an all-out sprint.

That makes it a strong tool for hybrid athletes who want hard conditioning without more running, or easy aerobic volume on a day the legs are sore. If you want the bike placed in a full week for you, a hybrid plan you can copy shows where it goes.

Conditioning is one piece of a bigger week. If you're a runner adding off-feet work, a guide to strength and conditioning for runners covers how it fits with the running and lifting first.

Does air bike training actually work?

Yes, and it doesn't need to be long. In Moghaddam et al. (2023), recreationally active people trained three times a week for four weeks on stationary air bikes, doing either all-out sprint intervals (10 seconds on and 5 off, or 20 on and 10 off, in three sets of eight) or 30 minutes of continuous riding at 75% of heart rate reserve. All three groups improved VO2max, time to exhaustion and METs by similar amounts, even though the sprint groups did far less total work.

That matches the wider research. In Gillen et al. (2016), three 20-second all-out cycle sprints inside a 10-minute session improved peak oxygen uptake as much as 45 minutes of continuous cycling over 12 weeks. And a meta-analysis of 28 studies (Milanović, Sporiš and Weston, 2015) found both continuous training and HIIT produced large improvements in VO2max, with slightly bigger gains after HIIT.

The air bike is also a fair test of your engine, at least once you're used to it. In a small crossover study (Lipscomb et al., 2024), VO2max measured on an air bike agreed well with a treadmill test for people familiar with the bike, though agreement was weaker for people who weren't. Translation: give yourself a few sessions to learn the machine before you judge your numbers.

How hard is hard? Effort zones on the bike

We use the same five-zone model across this blog. On the bike, effort is often more useful than heart rate, because heart rate lags behind short efforts.

Easy rides should feel almost too easy. The right liss cardio heart rate on the bike is the same as anywhere else: zone 2, where you can still talk.

Eight assault bike workouts

Warm up for 5–10 minutes easy before every hard session, with a few short pickups. Cool down for 5 minutes easy after.

1. The easy ride (aerobic base)

• ›30–45 minutes, zone 2, steady

The least exciting session on this list and the one you'll use most. Good on a rest-ish day, after an upper-body lift, or when running volume needs a break.

2. 4 × 4 minutes

• ›4 minutes hard (zone 5), 3 minutes easy, × 4

Borrowed from Helgerud et al. (2007), where 4 × 4-minute intervals at 90–95% of max heart rate (with 3-minute active recoveries) improved VO2max more than the same total work done at threshold or as long slow distance. The study was running, but the structure travels well to the bike.

3. Minute on, minute off

• ›1 minute hard (zone 4–5), 1 minute easy, × 8–10

A good first interval session. Hold the same calorie count each hard minute. If it drops by more than a couple of calories, you started too hard.

4. 30/30s

• ›30 seconds hard, 30 seconds easy, × 10–16

Short enough to stay fast, long enough to hurt. Heart rate will climb across the set even though each rep is short.

5. Short sprints

• ›20 seconds all-out, 2 minutes very easy, × 3

The Gillen protocol: three 20-second sprints with two minutes of easy pedaling between them. Ten minutes including warm-up and cool-down. All-out means all-out; this only works if the sprints are genuinely maximal.

6. 20/10s (Tabata-style)

• ›20 seconds all-out, 10 seconds rest, × 8

The original protocol used seven to eight sets of 20 seconds at about 170% of VO2max with 10 seconds of rest (Tabata et al., 1996). Most "Tabata" classes are nowhere near that intensity. Tabata training on an air bike can be, which is why it's short and why one set is plenty.

7. Calorie EMOM

• ›Every minute on the minute, 10–15 calories (scale to finish in about 40 seconds), × 10

You rest for whatever's left of each minute. If you can't finish inside the minute, lower the target.

8. Bike and kettlebell AMRAP

• ›15 minutes: 12 calories, 10 kettlebell swings, 8 goblet squats

Bike work slots neatly into mixed formats. For how to structure and pace these, our guide to AMRAP workouts has more examples. Pair the bike with kettlebell workouts for hybrid athletes and you have most of a conditioning toolkit in a corner of the gym.

A 6-week assault bike workout plan

Two bike sessions a week: one easy, one hard. The hard session replaces a hard conditioning day; it doesn't add one.

Write down your week 6 benchmark. Repeat the block with the hard sessions nudged up (an extra rep, a few more calories per interval) and test again. If your score goes up and the easy rides feel easier at the same heart rate, the plan is working.

Where the bike fits in a hybrid week

The rules are the same as any conditioning:

• ›Hard bike sessions are hard days. Count them alongside intervals, tempo runs and heavy leg sessions. Two or three hard days a week, total.
• ›They can replace a hard run. If your legs need a break from impact, swap one interval run for a bike interval session. Don't run the intervals and bike them.
• ›Easy rides go almost anywhere. After an upper-body lift, on a rest-ish day, the day after a long run.
• ›Not the day before heavy legs or your key run. The air bike works your legs hard, even with arms helping.

The general logic, keeping hard days hard and easy days easy across two sports, is what it takes to train for both.

Assault bike for Hyrox and hero workouts

The air bike isn't one of the Hyrox stations. The race runs 1 km, then one station, eight times, and the stations include a SkiErg and a row but no bike (official race format). It's still useful for Hyrox prep as low-impact engine work and as a hard session that spares your running legs. More on how to train for Hyrox, including the running, the stations and the week that fits both, lives in its own guide.

The same goes for benchmark workouts. If you're chasing a faster murph workout time, the bike builds the engine, but it won't do the bodyweight reps for you.

Common assault bike mistakes

• ›Going out too hard. Every first-timer does it. The fan feels light for 20 seconds, then it doesn't.
• ›Arms only, or legs only. Push and pull with the arms and drive with the legs. Using both is the point of the machine.
• ›Every session all-out. Most of your bike time should be easy. All-out every time just makes you dread the bike.
• ›Ignoring the seat height. A slight bend in the knee at the bottom of the stroke, like any bike.
• ›Comparing calories across machines. Different bikes read differently. Compare yourself to yourself on the same bike.

How exrsz handles it

exrsz builds a periodized plan from your goal, schedule, level and equipment, so if you've got an air bike, it can program easy rides and interval sessions around your running and lifting. It counts hard bike sessions as hard days, adapts each week to how you actually trained, and reshuffles missed sessions without stacking them.

FAQ

Is the assault bike good for conditioning?

Yes. In a four-week air bike study, both sprint intervals and continuous riding improved VO2max and time to exhaustion by similar amounts, with the sprint groups doing far less total work.

How often should I do assault bike workouts?

One hard bike session and one or two easy rides a week is a solid assault bike workout plan for most people who also run or lift. Count the hard session as one of your two or three hard days.

Is 20 minutes on the assault bike a good workout?

It can be, depending on the effort. Twenty minutes easy is a useful aerobic session; twenty minutes of intervals is a hard day. Decide which one you're doing before you start.

Can the assault bike replace running?

For conditioning, partly. It builds the engine without impact, and it can replace a hard run in a week when your legs need a break. It won't build the running-specific strength and skill that running does.

What's a good beginner assault bike workout?

Start with minute on, minute off for six to eight rounds at a hard but controlled effort, plus one easy 20–30 minute ride a week. Add rounds before you add intensity.