Power meters · Public discussion

3 days off

Started by bigbadwoulfe · · Last activity · 5 posts · 1,540 views

← Back to Power meters

Thread details

What we know about this thread

Original section
Power meters
Published
26 March 2008
Last activity
27 March 2008
Original author
bigbadwoulfe
Posts
5
Discussion status
Public discussion
Total views
1,540
Views / 30 days
0
Topics
VO2 maxFTPGroup ridingMountain bikingRace licensingThreshold training

The navigation and discussion metadata provide context. Posts remain in their original chronological order.

Showing posts 1–5 of 5
Posts remain in their original chronological order.

Text size
  1. Original post
    bigbadwoulfe
    Archived post
    #1

    Hi everyone. I've been for training for the last 4 months or so for my first ever MTB race. I have gained decent power since then. I give credit to this forum for that. For the last three days, I had been very busy and was not able to ride my bike at all. Too much time consumed by business, job, and new baby. Prior to this, I was doing my regular routine of SST and FTP. Now my question is, did I loose fitness over the 3 days that I was off the bike?

    Addtional info.
    Sunday was a two hour SST ride at 85%
    Monday was a scheduled off day
    Tuesday I was feeling ok and was raring to go but got dissapointed because I had to attend to something urgent, so ride got cancelled
    Wednesday I was ok to go but found out I cant because of work.
    Tomorrow (Its still wednesday here) I will be riding (I hope) and I wonder if I can crank it up to my usual power level or I have to do SST work just to re introduce some fitness that I may have lost during the last 3 days.

    Thanks for the replies everyone.
    (Sorry for the english, its not my native language)

    Report
  2. grahamspringett
    Archived post
    #2

    Relax. You will lose absolutely no fitness at all in 3 days. None. There may even be some improvement as your body recovers to a stronger point. Just carry on, you're fine. Honestly.

    I've just had 10 days off after a virus and last night I did an hour sweet spot on the turbo and felt fine.

    Report
  3. daveryanwyoming
    Archived post
    #3
    bigbadwoulfe said:

    ... Now my question is, did I loose fitness over the 3 days that I was off the bike? ...

    +1 on Graham's reply.

    Remember, the adaptations that training brings are slow. Increased heart stroke volume, increased red blood cell count, increased mitochondrial densities in the working muscles, increased capillarly bed densities around those muscles. Those sort of changes don't happen in just a couple of days. You can't cram for fitness, it takes steady and long term efforts to bring about these positive changes.

    The flip side of the coin is that they don't evaporate over night either. Take away the excess training stress and your body will begin to detrain but it takes a while. Yeah, unfortunately we seem to detrain faster than we train but still it takes time.

    But you may very well feel sluggish after a few days of total rest. That's pretty normal and why I never race after a complete rest day. I don't really understand all the physiology, but folks tend to need an openers ride to loosen the muscles back up and get them ready for hard efforts after complete rest days. So your first ride or two may feel off but don't let that worry you. As grahamspringett said, 3 days is really just a good rest after a long block of steady training. Once you've loosened up you should feel better than ever and quite possibly put out some personal best efforts.

    Good luck,
    -Dave

    Report
  4. Ade Merckx
    Archived post
    #4
    daveryanwyoming said:

    +1 on Graham's reply.

    .

    But you may very well feel sluggish after a few days of total rest. That's pretty normal and why I never race after a complete rest day. I don't really understand all the physiology, but folks tend to need an openers ride to loosen the muscles back up and get them ready for hard efforts after complete rest days. So your first ride or two may feel off but don't let that worry you. As grahamspringett said, 3 days is really just a good rest after a long block of steady training. Once you've loosened up you should feel better than ever and quite possibly put out some personal best efforts.

    Good luck,
    -Dave

    Yeah I gotta agree with the sluggish but somehow fresh feeling. As an oldie but hopefully goodie I a little bit of threshold pressure (~20mins) the day before a race is a must 🙂

    Report
  5. bigbadwoulfe
    Archived post
    #5

    Thanks guys 😄! I feel nervous about de training since my first race is just 11 days away.

    On another issue, I haven't done any vo2max intervals lately but i often reach vo2max intensity during our group rides on the weekend. Do you guys think that is enough or should I concentrate on vo2max these following days leading to the event? I heared the route will be very very hilly with 3 to 4 minute climbs with a gradient of at least 50% or more on those climbs. (MTB rider here) 😕

    Report

Keep exploring

Browse the sectionPower meters Return to CyclingForumsStart at the home page Search discussionsFind another thread

Active in the last 60 minutes

Active in this thread

0 users · 0 guests ·0 bots ·0 total

No signed-in users are active right now.

No known search crawlers active right now.