Oh the irony....

Originally Posted by swampy1970

Thinking back over the past year, I've often wondered why despite improving, I've not improved as much as I thought I would - in comparison to how I improved due to training when I used to race.

Originally Posted by john979

How big are you? If you can 340-380 watts for 45 minutes, you should be a CAT2...

Originally Posted by swampy1970

My Doc was pretty open yesterday about how he's completely baffled but also pointed out that it's "Kaiser policy" to do a PFT before an echo, hence the echo cannot be ordered before a PFT. Why, I have no idea...

My wife has a friend who's worked at Kaiser as a nurse for many years and we're going to have a chat over the weekend about exactly how to involve "member services" to get things taken care of sooner rather than later. But I think I'm just going to give UCD a call and at the very least get a cost. I know their sports dept does VO2 max testing and all that good stuff and it was cheaper than what I thought it'd be....

The one thing that intregues me now is that my voice has been 'jacked' for the past couple of weeks, almost to the point of going out. Even with the antibiotics they put me on last week, that didn't improve.

Thinking back over the past year, I've often wondered why despite improving, I've not improved as much as I thought I would - in comparison to how I improved due to training when I used to race. Progression was there - but it was slower and to be honest I've always been pretty good at sports that were pretty tough aerobically. I was asked to go swim for one of the better clubs in England (Wigan Wasps) when I was 12, represented the towns schools in cross country running and track at 16 and was pretty handy on a bike too up until my mid 20's. So recently, busting my ass for over 2 years and still only managing to muster enough pace up hills to match people who don't win 4th Cat races was becoming a little hard to swallow. The past few months saw some nice gains but maybe that's another story. Maybe I've had issues this past year or so and didn't know it.

John,

I don't have any power meter data, but then again if punch in some numbers into analytical cycling for the climbs, then numbers come out to between 340 and 380 watts - and the climb near here that I basically live on during training takes about 45 minutes and I do it a few times. So to go from that to stuggling to walk across the parking lot at a normal pace is about where I'm at. That said I have felt somewhat better the past couple of days... I haven't touched the bike the past few weeks.

Originally Posted by Steve_B

Yeah, if he was of average height and weight, I'd agree.

I seem to remember him mentioning more typical numbers on his coach's trainer back when he was a lad in "old Blighty". 300-320 W intervals, around in there somewhere, stuff like that.

No offence to Mr. Swampy but I'd say that he'd better be pretty sure that he was putting the right numbers in to acc.com. I've seen some people make some colossal mistakes making the wrong assumptions and/or putting the wrong numbers into the website.

Originally Posted by Fday

The rules are there for a reason, to keep costs under control, but they can also be broken under special circumstances. When I was in the military, which is very similar to the Kaiser system, except for the deployments, all it took, usually, was a call to my boss or the boss above him to say I had something that needed something out of the ordinary. Your doc should be able to get this done if he really wants to. Maybe he is new to the system and doesn't know how to stand up for the patients yet. IMHO, your problem deserves more action. I don't know what the issue is (based upon your last post, maybe you have an endocrine problem, like thyroid, blood work would be nice also). Something is going on. If I were your doctor I would be on the phone trying to get answers sooner than later. It is not like you have a rash. You have gone from vigourous athlete to being unable to walk across a parking lot in a short period of time. I would want to know what is going on before it got any worse.

Originally Posted by john979

The more immediate concern is to get health. When you are healthy, go invest in a power tap. This will help you to get back to form without overstressing yourself.

John

Originally Posted by swampy1970

I was thinking about it. I was actually going to take advantage of the "rent one for a week" deal that some dealers are offering during July and take it up on the Deathride.

As for the overstressing part. Due to the length of my hilly rides I always took care to keep the HR down on the hills. I don't know what my max HR is right now but it used to be 212 (12 years ago) but I rarely see over 180. I know that max value has probably come down but by how much I'm not sure.

Originally Posted by john979

Did they test creatine phosphokinase (CK), serum aldolase and aspartate aminotransferase (AST)?

Do you have any chest or shoulder pain or discomfort on the left side?

Originally Posted by john979

The great thing about a PM, when coupled with the right software (Cycling Peaks Software) you get a precise quantification of your training load. PM (or HR) monitoring is great during the ride, but you need to look at data holistically as well.

Originally Posted by Fday

If I were your doctor I would be on the phone trying to get answers sooner than later. It is not like you have a rash. You have gone from vigourous athlete to being unable to walk across a parking lot in a short period of time. I would want to know what is going on before it got any worse.

Originally Posted by Steve_B

Welcome to the US health system, Swampy. You have to be a strong advocate for yourself since no one else is going to do it for you, not even your doctor. He/she is way too busy, way too tied up in health insurance red tape and way too afraid of getting sued. Your doctor may actually resist you and fight you if you try to be more pushy and demanding. It's silly but I've seen it happen.