Is it too much and how long should i rest in-between?

[Molala2]

Hello everyone,

I have been riding for like 2 years now, simply trying to ride faster everytime. Recently I have started training seriously doing HIT on bike trainer, the info are as follows:

Gender: Male
Age: 36
Duration of exercise: 45 mins excluding warm up and cool down
Avg heart beat during exercise: 150
Exercise mode: riding against resistance at 70RPM
resting heart rate: did not check take serisouly but when i idle on a chair just breathing my hear rate is around 65
exercise effect: feel lighter with my legs
post exercise: now i rest 3 days after the exercise, i have been reading that resting is key to HIT, so i am planning to take 6 days rest
post exercise trauma: feel really sore when i sit long time in office. feel ok when i walk or do recovery ride.
please note that the effort is continuous, not interval.

Thanks.

 

[Felt_Rider]

I know there are "a number of ways to skin the cat" in approach to training and there are many types of goals. Based on your post I am not exactly sure what your ultimate goal is.

One session of HIT with 6 rest days seems like a whole lot of rest. I would think even those who do track sprints would have a bit more volume than once a week training session.

Many of us on the forum are more endurance oriented in our goals and tend to find a path that will allow us to increase training time. "Train more so you can train more." It is a slow and gradual process for many of us to incrementally increase duration and/or intensity loads as adaptation time will vary per individual's genetic potential and lifestyle.

 

[An old Guy]

Originally Posted by Molala2

I have started training seriously doing HIT

the effort is continuous, not interval.

Whatever you are doing is not HIT. HIT is all about intervals.

You should not be as sore as you appear to be. Perhaps you can cut back on your effort a bit.

You might cut back on the rest also. 6 days or even 3 days off negates the benefits of the one day on.

 

[smaryka]

You're losing more fitness than you're gaining by resting 3 days after a 45 min workout, and resting 6 days after a "high intensity" workout.

In your case, rest less and ride more! Lots more.

 

[Manu3172]

Hello,

Indeed, 3 days rest is already too much.
1 day rest means 3 training sessions a week which is not that much.
I think 1 day rest should be a good objective (or 2 from time to time).

 

[needmoreair]

If you want to get faster, try riding every day. Make one or two of those rides harder. Very simple, very effective.

 

[Molala2]

my objective is to push my LT by exercising in Zone 4, and also lose some weight

I do zone 4 exercises with days apart, and in between i do some easy ride to lose about 1600KCAL

 

[dhk2]

Originally Posted by Molala2
my objective is to push my LT by exercising in Zone 4, and also lose some weight

I do zone 4 exercises with days apart, and in between i do some easy ride to lose about 1600KCAL

Agree with others here. If you're getting sore enough to require a three-day rest after each 45 min session, that's too hard for your current level of conditioning. Better to ride everyday at a lower level, give your legs and cardio a chance to adapt before worrying about "level 4" or any other high intensity intervals.

First, suggest you raise your cadence from 70 to 85-90 range by decreasing the load setting and/or using a lower gear. By spinning faster, you can put out the same (or more) power with less load on the legs, easing the recovery time needed between sessions.

Also recommend you drop the intensity enough so that your max HR does not exceed 130-135. You may find it's hard to keep it this low initially, particularly when you're spinning at a 90 cadence. But hours of this lower level training will give you the conditioning you need without getting sore. Goal should be to train every day for 45 minutes without soreness. Once achieved, after maybe 2-3 months, you can move into one or two harder workouts a week (keeping your daily sessions). It takes time to build aerobic endurance.

For losing weight, consistent daily exercise is best for keeping your metabolism high, not hard efforts once or twice a week. The more you can stand or walk during your office day, the better. Your diet really controls your weight anyway, not so much your exercise. For me, and I suspect many others, diet is the harder part of the fitness equation.

 

[Molala2]

thanks everyone for their reply.

I have changed my exercise routine, from today on i try to ride on the trainer against very low resistance and keep it at around 100 rpm. for this couple days i will do it for 30 mins. Later i will add it up to 45 and then 60 when the soreness issue goes away. I try to do this everyday.

I think i have to give up the "resistance training at zone 4" concept anyway, coz it really wrecks my legs. I have done 5 times of it, my usual speed goes up from 28.5 to 30.5 KM/H, but i am already feeling some pain in my left knee.