I’ve been off the bike/run for 3 weeks now, after having trained lightly for the 3 or 4 weeks before that. Knee trouble. Anxious, I rolled out the CT for an easy 30 min super easy spin to see if it worsened the knee. The good news is that it didn’t make the knee worse (it stayed minorly bothersome). The bad news is that a ridiculously light 100w had my HR in the mid 120s, and my legs felt like they had actually done some work.
I couldn’t believe it. I’m no monster on the bike w/ hour TT power typically in the 230-250 range (at HR ~175), and my fastest century ride is a 4:50 (group for 1st half, solo for the last 50). But this is ridiculous! I’ve been swimming 4-7 hours/week, so it’s not like I’ve been completely goofing off.
The lesson… offseasons, extended breaks, etc., are overrated!!! Stay on your bike/feet!
Speaking from a totally anecdotal standpoint…even in the height of training, how do you feel after taking a day off? A little sluggish, a bit stale…yeah, you’ve lost some fitness but one does need time off. That you took complete time off (except for swimming) would likely explain much of what you felt today, but what was your alternative if you’re trying to heal an injury? Lengthen recovery time?
Fitness is specific to what you have been doing. You are more what I would term detrained rather than a loss of fitness. Loss of fitness to me means you have been doing nothing for about 6-8weeks.
Your better off taking the time off now to heal the injury than spending the next 6months never being able to get into great shape due to injury.
Fitness is specific to what you have been doing. You are more what I would term detrained rather than a loss of fitness. Loss of fitness to me means you have been doing nothing for about 6-8weeks.
Your better off taking the time off now to heal the injury than spending the next 6months never being able to get into great shape due to injury.
I agree w/ that (and Mike C). Just shocked at the extent of detrainitude, detraination, detrainification, etc. I’m hoping for a clear identifiable problem via MRI so this can get fixed fast rather than hope that time off will heal it. My '06 is already in flames since Honu was (is) my A race in early June. In the meantime, swim, swim, swim.