Originally Posted by
DreamRider85
I’m a little discouraged because yesterday I felt amazing. Went really hard and my training has been improving. Today I couldn’t go. When I woke up I felt fine but once I got on my bike I didn’t feel right. My butt was a bit sore, legs felt kinda sluggish going through the motion, though not sore. I only rode for about 45 minutes instead of 3 hours and I had enough. Yesterday I felt like I was flying, today I felt like a snail.
Why does the body do this to us? What exactly is happening? When can I expect to bounce back?
As others have said: whether you chalk it up to evolution, or a protection mechanism, or simply the body's "recharging" mode ... recovery needs to occur before we're top-notch again.
Back in the day, as a half-decent middle-distance runner, I'd gotten to the point where fairly hard training could occur ~2-3x per week on average, with most of the rest simply very fast on the flats or longer/slower "base" mileage. (These were years when I'd often do 150mi or more cycling each week, as well; not a lot, but enough to get the legs' attention.)
Very hard efforts required another day+ of recovery. On those "off" days, I'd ratchet-back the intensity to be something much more sedate, but likely much longer distance. I'd call those "recovery' runs. Challenging runs, from a distance or overall time perspective, but nowhere near as hard-hitting as a "hard" training run (hills, hard intervals, switchback climbs, sprints, etc). The first several years I was running, I couldn't tolerate the tougher sequences that frequently. At my peak, 2-3x per week for the tough stuff was typical, sometimes with a fourth rough session tossed in to see if I could tolerate it.
Point being: the body knows, and it'll tell you when it's zapped. No matter the level of fitness or strength you have, your body needs to recharge its reserves, rebuild the minor damage you've done to muscles so they're ready for the next hard efforts. Focus on your stretching, nutrition, soaking/massage, and "off" effort exercising ("recovery" rides or runs or some other physical activity that'll get the blood pumping but won't be nearly so hard on the muscles as that hard effort that got you achy in the first place).
Typical for me, back in the day:
* Running -- if a couple of harder days resulted in the body feeling a bit "flat," then the next couple of runs and rides would be longer, slower, on flatter routes. Still good exercise, but focusing on something not so muscle-intensive. Good stretching, "recovery" nutrition to rebuild, good sleep. Might take a couple of days, depending on the intensity of that "hard" effort that was so painful.
* Cycling -- most "hard" rides (for me) in the 20-40mi range, flatter and faster, with a couple of 200-300ft climbs. Occasional hard rides, hills or very fast. Generally required a couple days' of recovery, doing much slower and varied activities until the legs "had it" again. Could ride hours and hours, but the harder stuff I'd generally limit to <40mi.
^ Not very scientific, I know. But through experience I learned quite a lot about how my own body would tolerate certain levels of training, and how much recovery (and of what types) that seemed to work best. Found that a good base of "cross" training with various types of exercise helped quite a bit. Found nutrition and sleep mattered more than I expected. Found that doing a longer/slower effort could itself be one of the best ways to recover from an early hard stint. As fitness improved, the amount of time to recover fully would decrease, and the amount of reduced-intensity exercise I could do while recovery would improve.