banerjek

Lately, my legs have been perpetually sore. There's nothing wrong with them -- I've just been riding harder than I should during the week. I'd love to take it easy, but winds have been an issue and a recovery spin in such conditions yields such ridiculously slow speeds it messes up my schedule. On weekends, I've been torching my legs on the slopes.

When I woke up today, I found myself dreading my ride (which is something that never happens). Even though I have to drive tomorrow anyway, I thought I could really use two days off. Or at least settle for an easy spin on the trainer or an easy loop.

I don't like being inactive, but I justified it by telling myself I'm too sore to put in an effort that would have any fitness benefit. Plus, it's no fun to feel weak and pathetic even when applying your best effort. Of course I also miss getting out in the air, but two days away from that should prove downright motivational when I return.

So two questions: 1) Is there any truth at all in the idea that I could get no fitness benefit from riding on sore (but uninjured) legs or am I just grasping at straws; and 2) When do you take an outright break without even taking a recovery ride?

Andy Somnifac 

Your body gets stronger when it recovers. If you're dreading your ride, you need time off the bike.

canam73

I've read in a few places that when training hard every 4th week should be a recovery week. Due to work, kids and other interests I end up following that whether I want to or not. Seems to work well for me.

ColinL

if you are that busy on the weekends skiing you probably do need to take a day off the bike during the week.

a true recovery ride for most people is around half their normal speed. if you're going faster than 10-12 mph it's probably not a recovery ride. if 10-12mph is too slow to get you to work on time, you need to drive to work.

when you have no recovery time you wear down muscle rather than build it up.

bored117 

1) You increase the chance of injury. I think that alone is enough to take a break. A simple tendonite is enough to knock someone off for a month+. If I were on your shoes, definitely not risking it.
2) Only time I did that for more than a day was when I was injured. Otherwise, just real easy spinning around for less than an hour actually made me feel better (for soreness and speed of recovery) than just sitting around. By recovery I mean around 50% or below of my FTP. If you have upright bike, probably better suited.

Beaker

+1

RJM

If I dread the ride, I don't ride. Sposda be fun anyway.

It sounds to me like you need a few days off the bike.

rangerdavid

+2

Myosmith

When your performance stops improving despite the same training, you have plateaued and need to increase the intensity.
When your performance declines despite the same training, you are overtrained and need to decrease the intensity (take a break) temporarily to allow for recovery.

Good training should have adequate rest built in to the program. If you are pushing your limits every day for an extended period you will fry, physically and mentally.

adriano 

you will still get a benefit from riding when you are sore.

Drew Eckhardt 

It depends on why you're sore, what quantity and sort of riding you've been doing relative to your fitness level, and how hard you try to ride.

Exacerbating a repetitive stress injury (like from bad position) is going to be especially damaging.

With too much recent combination of intensity and duration anything more than "embarrassingly slow" will slow your recovery and how soon you can have an effective workout which is counter productive and you'd do better off the bike.

OTOH, there are days when it feels hard but you're not over doing it and should just dig deeper.

kv501

Probably not the best place to come to complain about being able to ride more than you want to. Many if not most people here have careers, kids, spouses, family functions, other hobbies, and whatever else to fit their rides around.

I understand what you're trying to get at here, but come on, man. If your legs hurt get off the bike for 2 days. If you miss the outdoors, take a walk with your wife. If you're worried about being inactive do some push-ups. Unrocketscientific.

Your life isn't going to end, you won't have a total mental breakdown, and you're not going to gain 27 lbs and have your arteries clog up from riding 28 days in one month instead of 30. We all know you're hard core, you ride in the snow and hate being off your bike. That's good enough for us to know it; let it be.

Brian Ratliff

You do not get fitness benefit if you are unable to ride hard enough to get a fitness benefit. Fitness building is a cycle of stress and rest. Your body is prompted to make changes by stressing it, and it is enabled the resources to make those changes when you rest. If you ride constantly on sore legs, you will not improve until you take a rest. Now, riding on sore legs has been shown to increase stress on the body. Seems an obvious point, but it means that stacking days of work, then resting, will yield more improvements than interspersing rest with the workouts. But, those improvements don't present until you rest, and there is probably a point of diminishing returns, especially if you are training solo and don't have external factors pushing you even after you feel like you can't be pushed.

If you read Bicycling Magazine, this is the "80% trap" they talk about. Now, it is commonly misinterpreted. 80% is a fine intensity to ride at; it will lead to lots of adaptation, provided you both push yourself occasionally much harder than 80%, and you also rest (which is required if you are going to train close to 100%). The trap is when you train constantly at 80% to the point where 80% is all you are ever able to muster. You never rest, and subsequently, you are never physically able to train at intensities close to 100%. This is you right now. If you keep doing what you are doing, you will never improve.

"Recovery ride" is the same thing as an "outright break" for everyone except for the very optimally trained; "optimally trained" meaning you are dedicating your life to training (hence everything you do is optimized towards performance in a sport). For everyone else, meaning recreational up to amateur Cat 3 racer, "recovery ride" and "sit on the couch" are pretty much interchangeable. This means you do what makes you feel good. Some people like recovery rides. Some are lazy like me and like to sit on the couch. I have gotten relatively good at cycling by alternately training and sitting on the couch. I, personally, view recovery as time I can spend doing something not bicycle related.

clichty

https://bicycling.com/blogs/fitchick/...bird-watching/

Saw this browsing today, thought it was relevant to this thread.

"A few years ago I interviewed Indiana University exercise psychologist, John Raglin, PhD, who has done a fair amount of research in the department of overtraining. He told me that mood monitoring was probably one of the best tools cyclists could use to prevent the staleness and persistent fatigue that often plagues riders who go too hard and rest too little. Staleness, he explained is the end result of a string of biological disruptions like rising stress hormones, dips in feel-good neurochemicals like serotonin, and muscle breakdown that accompany too much overreaching without enough recovering. Cyclists are particularly vulnerable because our sport is low impact. We can literally ride ourselves into the ground past the point that other athletes like runners would be crippled with injury. Recreational cyclists (i.e. those of us with families and day jobs) are at even greater risk because we’re often not resting even when we’re “resting.”
Like canaries in the coalmine, your moods are the earliest indication of when those biological factors are sailing south. As Raglin told me, “With hard training, you’re bound to feel tired and agitated. But that mood should improve with rest and you should be ready to go by the next session. If your mood is persistently low, you need to pull back until you feel better.”

surreycrv 

how so? time is a constant. a 2 hr ride into the wind is the same amount of time as a 2 hr ride with the wind. unless you find that a ton of feathers weighs more than a ton of bricks.

roby

but 30km to work is 30km to work regardless of speed. He's mentioned driving to work, so it sounds like he's commuting.

RT

How hard do you ride? I have been sore, but did not have the luxury of a day off as the daughter had the car, so I had to ride to work (25 mile round tripper). I enjoyed the rides, but these were not leisurely flat-road events, I tend to kill it when I ride alone. Don't think it hurt me, but then I may not have achieved the same degree of soreness that you have.

My point is, some folks don't have the choice of a day off. Come to think of it, I know I have never been sore enough where not riding was an option. Worn the Hell out, yes, but never sore.

roby

<pointlessbutfunny>

I've been sore to the point of rolling out of the bed, scootching down the stairs on my ass and having to take a scorching hot shower to warm up my muscles before I could manage a stable walk. I drove that day, and the next.

</pointlessbutfunny>

gigantor

My recovery days : riding around with friends and not looking at my cycling computer.

larry e.

I have been feeling sore at the start of rides lately as well. I am talking sore and tired to the point where I am convinced my brakes are rubbing etc. I still commute to work. Granted it's a flat 10mi round trip, but I think of those days as "days off."

merlinextraligh

Overtraining, Pfft....

If you overtrained, it means that you didn't train hard enough to handle that level of training, So you weren't overtrained; you were actually undertrained to begin with. So there's the rule again: The guy who trains the hardest, the most, wins.*















*Of Course this approach may work better with a regiment of testosterone and Jack Daniels

RT

That is a definitely day off material.

banerjek

Correct. Distance to work is 22mi. If I don't move right along, the time commitment becomes excessive. This is particularly true in bad weather.

Also correct. But self inflicted pain needs to be fun, and I don't train as I don't find it fun. This means I spend too much time riding hard (which is fun) rather than doing something that would maximize my performance (i.e. I would suck somewhat less than I do now).

While I don't mind not improving, I don't want to do something that actually makes me worse. But I also don't want to fall into the trap of giving bogus excuses. I've always lived by the motto that the most important time to be out there is when you really don't want to be. Most conditions that people think of as miserable are a blast if you get your head in the right place with the added benefit that you develop a better ability to appreciate primo conditions for the gift that they are.

pallen

I don't know about the OP's situation, but I also find that the minimum distance to work is also a constant and wind speed can affect how long it takes me to get there.

merlinextraligh

I actually agree with Brian. You should rest. You'll feel better, You'll get stronger, and you'll be able to push harder.

I just like the Landis quote.