I don't know what a alpha is, but how you charge, how often, etc depends upon the battery chemistry. Same goes for discharge.

I'm going to assume you are using a NiCd or NiMH battery. But this may not be the case so double check your battery.

Typically, todays NiCd and NiMH don't suffer from memory issues. An abused battery might, but in general, the battery manufactures had resolved most memory issues in NiCd/NiMH. You can find a lot of good info in the battery forum, but I'll list what I see as some key items.

Never over charge or over discharge the battery. This is very hard on the cells. Feel free to use most of the battery, but when you can tell the battery is going to die, don't force one more lap. Same on charging. Topping off a battery that has sat for a week is fine, but if you charged it to full yesterday, there is no need to top off the battery and doing so can be hard on the battery if you over charge the pack.

After you use the pack, simply fully charge the pack. A peak detection charge is best, but if all you have is a low current charger, that is fine. Just follow the instructions for charging that came with your charger.

The only good reason to cycle a battery is to verify the battery condition. A total discharge between every charge cycle is a waste of time. In the "old days" this was to prevent memory issues with the cells. This really isn't required anymore and I typically only cycle my packs once or twice a year.

Cheers