vistring, I just finally purchased a road bike in March/April and due to not ever having clipless shoes, etc I decided I should change my Thursday bike training rides into a commute to and from work. I drive about half way, then bike the other half (20 miles or so).

It hasn't worn me down at all, but rather, it has definitely helped my riding a huge amount. The first thing is that due to my newness with clipless, I had to unclip/reclip at a lot of stoplights on the way to work. So, I wouldn't say I'm an expert, but I can usually clip right away on first try now, as opposed to when I first started, it took a minute or so to clip. I've gotten really comfortable with it.

Additionally, I use some of the roads as intervals. Push it hard for the mile between lights, then recover for a mile between lights. It's a nice way for me to get a burn. :) And, if I'm not up to it for the day, at least I'm getting some miles under my butt. :)

Yes, I bike commute everywhere. Since I'm a homeschooling mom, it's often with my kids in tow on our tandem, or our tandem plus the tagalong.

Most years, about 30% of my mileage comes from bike commuting. Last season, despite putting in only one week of over 10 hours of tri-specific training, I turned in a 1:09 bike split in an Oly race and a 2:52 in the half-Iron. And that was with less than 5 hours a week on my tri bike. I think bike commuting adds a lot to my training. Specifically, it's just time on the bike, and also there's a lot of starting and stopping (on the tandem with both of my kids, that's a lot of weight to get going), and pushing bigger gears (I don't keep the cadence that I do on my tri bike).

In general, I'm always impressed with how much bike commuting and biking with my kids adds to my triathlon fitness.

I bike to work, to class, to the gym... but they're all within 2 miles of my place... so not much.

I do not own a car and commute everywhere 365 by bike, do IMs etc. I ride a minimum of 52km (30mi) per day. It takes a while to learn how to go slow and save the right intensity for the right time. But as Beads says, it will make you stronger for sure.

I use commuting as my main form of bike training because I ride uphill to and from work (sounds crazy, but the vertical climb and decent is the same for almost all hills, so the same ones you go up and down there you go back on) and because I somehow was able to make the touring bike i bought fit like my tri bike. So its like I am always training when I ride to work, plus hauling extra weight on the rear of the bike and the weight of the bike itself helps build strength as well.

I bike to work 3 days a week( roughly 90 miles), 1 a week go for a run right away when I get home. I will drive tues/thurs so i can get my pool swim in the morning and run in the afternoon. I feel that being able to bike to work uses time more effectively than driving to work because you have already worked out twice by the time you get home.

Burn calories, not oil.

Here is my workhorse of a commuter bike (the one in front of the two Bike Friday tandems):

I bought this bike because at the time I had a 22 mile roundtrip commute that consisted of gravel road, dirt trail with serious hills, mud, road with no shoulder, city streets with grates and potholes, and sidewalks. This has been a terrific bike and has lasted me 14 years of happy commuting so far. When I used to commute on dirt, mud, and gravel I had knobbies on it, now I just have street tires.

I haven't found any negative effect whatsoever with switching between my tri bike, this bike, and the red tandem behind it.

This is something I've wondered about as a newbie, too! Does biking everywhere, often with hills involved count as some training? Should I take it into consideration when planning my training program? I usually just adjust if I feel like I've done a lot of bike commuting in a short amount of time. It definitely helps build up a base though!

Great post.

i count it in my log, but it doesn't replace training sessions