It's killing me but..........

It would be nice to know how Rapdaddyo and others who have contributed to this thread are getting along. I wonder how many have hung up their pedals for good. Late September I will be moving into my own place and intend to buy an indoor trainer of one sort or another. (Any recommendations on a trainer?) Unfortunately I had to leave my computrainer in Japan. My goal for next spring is an FTP of 250watts.
Perhaps I’m being a little ambitious at my age. Only time will tell.
Ciao,
Tyson

 

Just came back to this forum today after a long time away. Good to see some of the same people contributing.

The last time I was good on the bike was in 2016. I've had orthopedic problems since then, which I hope are now corrected. (Long story) After a few false starts I have now been riding/training for 10 weeks. My FTP is probably ~20-25 watts lower than it was and my endurance sucks. I estimate power from trainer rides on my KK. I'm 65 yo and I expect (hope) to get my FTP back to where it used to be (~240W) by springtime. I struggle to ride well on the second of back to back days. I picked up an older PT which is strung up on a 9 spd wheel. I am converting an older 7 spd bike to 9 spd so I can get some accurate power numbers going forward.

Good luck to those of you making a comeback. I look forward to hearing about your progress.

 

I don't check the forum regularly any more, but happened to check yesterday and saw Tyson's post.

I am still riding, but have had difficulty maintaining a consistent training schedule due to the demands of my projects. So, it seems that I ramp up my FTP to about 250W and then have to interrupt my training for a few months and start over at about 180W and build back up. I was on a good roll this summer until mid-July when I spent a week at my oldest daughter's house in Los Angeles. She lives on a hill about 4 mi in total length and ~7% avg grade that I rode every day. The problem is that the hill has several sections of ~11%-12% grade. I came back home with my glutes just trashed (technically, I suppose I trashed my quadratus lumborum muscles and not my glutes). Anyway, I'm back on the bike this week and hope to get back up to some good volume by the end of September. Fortunately, the Mount Charleston Hill Climb has not been posted this year, because I would not have been ready. I don't really know what my FTP potential is because I haven't been able to sustain a training program that will allow me to peak, but hopefully I will find out around the end of the year. I'll let you know. I'm curious myself.

 

I think that's a pretty good training. The only thing I would change, is to avoid having rest 2 days in a row. When you have more than one day resting, and then come back to exercise, you can feel somehow tired. Best thing to do, is to rest one day, then exercise the next one, and then rest again. Interval rest days are the best plan that's working for me so far.

 

Pedals are still on the bike and I am still pedaling. I came back to see if any of the old crew were still posting. Like RD my work schedule this year really interfered with training consistency and I am probably in the worst shape in several years. But I still keep trying and hope that maybe next year I can get back in the groove.

I hit a dog at 30 mph last summer and ended up with a lot physical and a torn PCL. It took me 6 months of rehab and light spinning then the work deadlines hit. I hope to keep at it and it is great to see you guys still at it as well.

 

Dogs are hell on cyclist. My dog encounter was a bit over 2 years ago now. Took me around 5 months to get my strength back and longer on the endurance. I wasn't doing more the 14 mph , maybe less.

 

Certainly have been my worst encounters out on the road with occasional hostile opinionated drivers being the next worst, but touch wood I have not been hit by a car yet.

 

I’m still riding and follow some of the old posters like Felt on Strava. At 52, it takes more work to maintain the old FTP. I also have become a huge fan of Zwift to ride, race, and interact with cyclists all over the world. My philosophy has always been train hard indoors with clear goals and ride outdoors for fun: races, group rides, and weekend spins with friends. It’s safer indoors if you’re training hard than being in traffic alone with a screaming high heart rate trying to make numbers.

As I’ve posted before,I always respected the intent of this thread and the way it brought folks together to share a lot of useful information. I was less enamored with it’s role in sharing questionable and unrealistic gains without evidence. But it was a helpful platform before the GPS and virtual platforms that have developed in the past few years.

Peace and good riding to all who contributed to this epic thread. You can find me on Strava or Zwift posting my ongoing struggles and progress.

 

I'll look for you on Zwift, kopride! 5,400 miles on Zwift has improved my power. Age 65 and still trying to go fast.

 

Yup, I’ve seen you on there as well. We are already on some Zwift related Facebook groups together as well. Look for Patrick Mcdonnell.

 

Recognize the name...again!...now. It's nothing but cold rain in Ohio this afternoon. I'll be in Central Park in just a couple hours!

 

Arthur Lydiard (jeez that name has been coming up quite a bit today) made the point that how could an athlete beat someone who trained 7 days a week if they took 52 days a year off training.

Lydiard cycled his training volumes so runners would do 45mins one day and 90mins the next. He would also vary the terrain and training courses. Firstly to prevent staleness but to also vary the training load. All done at best aerobic pace day in day out.

Best example of this is riders who finish the Tour de France and keep on racing day in day in the lucrative post tour crits or riders who used to use the Pro road racing as base work for Track Worlds when they were held later in the year.

As cyclists we confuse matters by racing so much and therefore often push ourselves into highly anaerobic states which requires greater recovery and perhaps limit ourselves from maximising our aerobic capacity. Something Lydiard warned of and I gave the example of a Swiss Pro whose racing commitments (ie the Boss tells you when you race) curtailed his career.

I know that my initial attempts at racing far too soon into my comeback from a five year layoff set me back a week at a time. Two days of training around my threshold (two days of IF >1) have left my legs a mess. That being said after my session of 2 X 20 I started the bunch ride yesterday with sore legs and a bit of cramp but was able to achieve a better workout than the day before.

 

Tyson here. As I head towards my 77th birthday, look out for news around the middle of March. Why March? All will be revealed.

 

Hello there,

Hopefully, this isn't totally bad form to post a question in someone else's thread (excuse me if it is and sincerest apologies!). There seems to be a huge amount of knowledge in this thread and great deal of posters

So my question is - I'm trying to get back to where I was prior to 2 long breaks caused by Achilles ruptures in both feet. (doc says injuries caused from overuse and overtraining)

I'm trying to work out if the schedule I've planned is intense enough to rebuild my previous form quickly or if it's too intense and going to break my body again I did this sort of thing in about 10 weeks previously, so I thought adding an additional 3 weeks to get back there is enough but I don't know, I'm a dork apparently because I've broken my Achilles twice with overtraining. I usually cycle in the morning and the afternoon and do one longer cycle on weekends - this is ideally what I'd like to get back up to. I take rest days as well of course.

I'm 32 years old, a girl if that makes a difference. Any thoughts on the below training schedule? Any advice would be greatly appreciated! I realise there aren't any interval rides in here strictly but I usually substitute one of the Z3-Z5 rides for intervals about once a week.

Thanks SO MUCH!

Week 1:
3 rides of 35km, very little climbing, Z3 - Z5
Week 2:
2 rides of 35 km, very little climbing Z3 - Z5
+ 1 ride of 45 km, 1100m of climbing Z3-Z5
Week 3:
1 ride of 35 km, very little climbing Z1- Z2
+ 2 rides of 45 1100m of climbing Z3-5
Week 4:
3 rides of 45km, 1100m of climbing Z3-5
Week 5:
same as week 4
Week 6:
2 ride of 35km, very little climbing, Z1-2
+ 2 rides of 45km, 1100m of climbing Z3-5
+1 ride of 100km, 1600m of climbing z3-5
Week 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12:
same as week 6
Week 13, 14, 15, 16:
4 rides of 45km, very little climbing, Z1-2
+ 4 rides of 45km, 1100m of climbing Z3-5
+1 ride of 100km, 1600m of climbing z3-5

 

It sounds as though your Achilles tendons are the weak links in your stroke. I have a similar weak link issue, but with my quadratus lumborum (QL) muscles. Basically, when I am in the early part of a build phase my leg muscles develop fitness sooner than my QL muscles. Even though the QL muscles aren't the primary muscles in producing power, they are nonetheless stressed as stabilizing muscles. If I'm not careful, my leg muscles can easily put them under more stress than they can handle. The result is extreme soreness, sometimes to the point that I can't ride at all for a few weeks.

So, if this is the case, what you want to avoid is too much torque too soon. It's less about total miles or even climbing miles or even zone. It's about torque. You can minimize torque at any intensity simply by increasing your cadence and reducing your torque. So, my suggestion is to ride at a relatively high cadence as well as do a gradual build of miles and intensity.

Hope this helps. Good luck.

 

Thanks so much for the reply! I never thought about that so definitely helpful. I'll try that - to up the cadence. I usually hover around 82 RPM, so I can definitely try to up that a little - what would be the sort of advisable RPM? 90? 92? (I'd have to practice pedal drills to maintain a smooth stroke faster than that haha)

 

A cadence of 90 or low 90s should work. Just remember that the goal is not to ride at a higher cadence, but rather to ride at a lower torque. Producing a given power at a higher cadence is simply a way to achieve the objective of reducing torque. BTW, if you watch the top pro riders, I think you'll find that many of them ride at a relatively high cadence (e.g., 90-100).

 

Okay, thanks so much for explaining. Makes sense. Will go ahead and do that Thank you!

 

Well, here we go.

Back in June in Japan following an MRI scan I was diagnosed with the early stages of prostate cancer. The surgeon, who I think is somewhat gung-ho booked me in to have the prostate removed in September 2018. He is quite famous for performing prostate removal with his “Davinci Machine” as it’s known by in Japan. I wasn’t offered any alternative treatment, so I decided to come here to the Uk for a second opinion.

After seeing a consultant and having my case discussed by various specialists, they decided it wasn’t necessary to remove the prostate and I underwent 6 months hormone therapy followed by 20 days of radiotherapy.

For anyone remotely interested, I’ll let you know the final outcome after seeing the consultant in the first week of May.

What has all this got to do with cycling? Well, I continued cycling through all the treatment, albeit at a lower level during radiotherapy. I didn’t suffer any of the possible side effects which the doctor put down to being very fit. So keep cycling guys!

As I approach my 77th birthday I’m slowly building up my stamina etc. again. It’s too early to do any high intensity workouts yet but perhaps in May eh? I’m considering acquiring an indoor trainer as my Computrainer is gathering dust in Japan. Does anyone here in the UK have a trainer they want to sell/donate?

Apologies for boring the pants of you. Will post again in May.


Ciao,

Tyson

 

Wow! They are opening a new enormous gym five minutes walk from my apartment. I am getting stronger by the day and can’t wait to get on the gym bikes. Hopefully they will have “power setting” capability.
Watch this space to see my FTP figures rise. I won’t say an FTP of 300W is possible, however, I think an FTP of 250W is on the cards .
I envisage starting around 130Watts but hopefully progress will be somewhat more rapid than the first time around.

Tyson