Time off after a peak

[joroshiba]

Alright, I'm hitting my big peak for the season in a couple weeks and have some questions about what to do after that. Last year I had a coach who said after my last big race of the year in early September, that 9 weeks off the bike were required to be able to build back up for this season. I rode a bit, maybe 4 hrs a week all unstructured and just for the heck of it and lost quite a bit of fitness. His claim was that this was required to build back stronger. In hindsight, I am 95% sure this was bull ****. I had to build back up from well... not where I could have been building from and have found good shape again, but I wasted a good couple months getting back to where I was.

My gut tells me that think to some extent, some time off can be useful for at least a mental recharge, and to let the body just get a little break. (Maybe 2 weeks of taking it easy seems reasonable) The question for those with more experience with such things, is how much time off, if any, do you need before building towards next season?

 

[daveryanwyoming]

I'd say trust your instincts. If you're fried after a busy racing season or particularly hard racing during your peak then take extra time off. If you've just dug a big hole due to your A races then take less time off but still allow for some recovery. It's awfully early in the year to hang up the bike and start resting prior to a winter build so I'd probably just regroup as much as you think is necessary and then keep riding and ideally find some new goals for the summer months.

Even if racing has wrapped up for you this year it can be awfully fun to use that fitness to do some long day rides or organized centuries or to find other cycling goals that keep you on the bike and riding a lot during the summer months. Unless you're prepping for a hard cyclocross season there's no real reason to hang up the bike this time of year and even that would be a short regrouping period before building towards cross.

Whether you take a longer break before your actual winter build when it does roll around depends a lot on how much you've ridden, how frequently you've raced and how much of a mental as well as physical break you might need before a long winter of rebuilding. If you've only raced a couple of dozen times or less all season you might not need a huge post season break but if you've raced several days a week for many months and pushed yourself very hard then some time completely away from the bike and from structured training can pay off by helping your motivation through the dark winter months when you do return to training.

FWIW in recent years I haven't taken more than a couple of easy to complete rest weeks after either the road season or the cyclocross season before resuming training and most folks I know that race both road and cross do the same. But the couple of seasons where I really got after the road season and raced to the bitter end only to go straight into cross I found myself pretty trashed and not very interested in getting on the bike after racing from February through December. I've definitely found it better to get some mental and physical breaks along the way but a couple of weeks seems to be enough.

YMMV,
-Dave

Originally Posted by joroshiba .

Alright, I'm hitting my big peak for the season in a couple weeks and have some questions about what to do after that. Last year I had a coach who said after my last big race of the year in early September, that 9 weeks off the bike were required to be able to build back up for this season. I rode a bit, maybe 4 hrs a week all unstructured and just for the heck of it and lost quite a bit of fitness. His claim was that this was required to build back stronger. In hindsight, I am 95% sure this was bull ****. I had to build back up from well... not where I could have been building from and have found good shape again, but I wasted a good couple months getting back to where I was.

My gut tells me that think to some extent, some time off can be useful for at least a mental recharge, and to let the body just get a little break. (Maybe 2 weeks of taking it easy seems reasonable) The question for those with more experience with such things, is how much time off, if any, do you need before building towards next season?

 

[vspa]

I've definitely found it better to get some mental and physical breaks along the way but a couple of weeks seems to be enough. YMMV, -Dave

+1

 

[danfoz]

+2.

2-3 weeks off is a lot different than 2 months off. And the tragedy of old(er) age is quickly becoming apparent to me. What took 3 months or so to aquire in my twenties seems to now take closer to 5 months (in my mid-forties) starting from scratch.

 

[jaretj]

2 to 4 weeks of "Do whatever I want to do" training is what I have done the last few years. Most of that time I'm on my Mountain Bike and ride until it's too cold for me.

jaretj