Caestille

Hi.

I do triathlon, so am not new to large training loads. I do a few runs and swims a week, and then usually a long ride and a fast ride. Recently, I've had a 12 week internship near where I live and I decided to cycle in to beat the traffic. Because of a 9-5 and super busy weekends for various reasons, this has essentially replaced my cycle training aside from the odd turbo session. Since this is the only cycling I do, I usually take the commute fast (for me and in traffic), and aim for 17-20 mph. So basically I'm doing 50 miles a week speed training. This was fine for about 8 weeks along with other training, but recently I've had no energy when cycling, tired and painful upper leg muscles and feel like I can't accelerate. I've had periods of 2-4 days off over weekends, and not had any improvement after those. My girlfriend is a physio and massaged my hamstrings which made them feel less tight, but quads and vastus medialis muscles feel really tight. Stairs are painful all the time. I'm only 22 and feel like I shouldn't be having this many issues with fatigue. I roll my muscles from time to time, and usually stretch a bit after rides. I'm skinny and always feel like I'm craving food after rides and training, though can't seem to eat enough at mealtimes to satisfy that before I'm full, and I don't let myself snack.

Is it just a case of man up and roll/stretch more?

canklecat

Try a heavy rolling pin on the quads and wherever you can reach on your legs.

Seriously.

I have a heavy marble rolling pin that's mostly decorative. A few months ago I noticed my quads were perpetually sore. I get nearly rigid muscles sometimes all over, especially in my neck, shoulders and back from injuries, but I can actually reach my legs easily. So I tried the rolling pin. Works better than a foam roller or percussion massager. With the foam roller I was contracting upper body muscles to place enough pressure to massage others. Sorta self-defeating. The weight of the rolling pin does the work. But a long handled percussion massager works pretty well too.

And try magnesium lactate and potassium lactate supplements. The lactate versions can cause some GI upset in some folks -- it made me gassy the firsts few times, but I got over that. The lactate versions work quicker to prevent and relieve muscle cramps. Sportlegs has mag lactate and other stuff in it, for convenience.

And stretching. Some cyclists seem to be allergic to stretching. But I need it just to function after so many injuries.

Due to various injuries over the decades I'm good for about 30 miles on the bike before muscle cramps set in. Often it's the neck, shoulders and entire torso from the spine to the sternum, so it's hard to take deep breaths. Happened after the 30 mile mark on Tuesday's ride, and I had 13 miles left to get home. It usually limits me to 50-70 mile rides at most, and usually half that distance. But all the stuff above helps.

Another possible remedy is to mix up your cycling training. Don't make every ride a workout. Occasionally, take a moderate to long leisurely ride, being alert to keeping the effort relatively lower. It may help to use a heart monitor, speedometer/cadence sensor and other tricks. For example, my trick to keep my effort down is to ride my hybrid rather than my road bikes. And I'll stick with the smaller chain rings. Just being on the hybrid nudges me to keep my effort around 10-12 mph. I can often ride 40 miles or more with less discomfort than on the road bikes, because I can't make myself relax on the road bikes. Every ride turns into a workout.

berner

The process of recovery has some rules of thumb but the main thing is to understand your own response to the process to get the best results. Part of it is simply allowing time to recover, as much time as necessary. Another part is adequate rest and nutrition. You are fortunate that in today's world there is a vast amount of information easily available on the web. https://www.google.com/search?client...enous+training

redlude97

Stop riding kinda hard all the time. That is the problem. You're probably working towards overtraining by always having intensity every day especially if its 2x/day. Its called riding in the gray zone

wolfchild

Very busy schedule, daily stress and responsibilities plus riding hard daily can easily prevent recovery and put your body in the state of overtraining. The only solution here is to dial down the intensity and ride at an easier pace...Consistency trumps intensity, always...Also make sure that your nutrition is good with plenty of carbs and protein.. At your young age you should be eating like a race horse.

Grotug

I'm 39 and riding a lot and also cannot eat enough. Why don't you snack? You should be eating every two hours.

Drew Eckhardt 

You're over-training and need rest weeks, usually 1 in 4 although some riders require 1 in 3 especially as we age. Over training is a function of relative intensity and duration not absolute. Depending on your baseline and intensity, averaging 150 miles a day could be fine or 50 miles weekly too much.

Your steady junk mile diet is making you tired and slow. Lots of us naively made that mistake when we didn't know better.

You can't ride sufficiently hard every day to stress your fast-twitch fibers and anaerobic energy system. At the same time, you're exerting yourself enough to recruit fast twitch fibers which take the load off slow twitch fibers so you're not training them either. If you had a good aerobic base, 17-18 MPH would be relaxed. With some anaerobic capacity on top of that, 20 MPH would be a pleasant tempo pace.

Riding "hard" depletes your glycogen stores leading to what runners call "runger" which can cause overeating. Conversely, at an endurance pace you use mostly fat and produce peptide YY which suppresses hunger. With more balance, I shrunk to 136 pounds and made more power than I did naively riding "fast" at 180. Riding 200 miles a week I had to choke down an extra 1800-3600 calories when I wasn't hungry to maintain weight.

You need to ride slower and faster to be fit and fast.
Training-intensity distribution during an ironman season: relationship with competition performance.
Adaptations to aerobic interval training: interactive effects of exercise intensity and total work duration.

Exercise as hard as you can manage for 30 minutes. Take your average heart rate over the last 20 minutes. That’s approximately your anaerobic threshold (AnT), Ventilatory Threshold 2, Lactate Threshold Heart Rate, and LT4. Exercise beyond that point will do the most to lift your lactate threshold and VO2max. 7–10 minute intervals as hard as possible are most effective. Stop when you can’t exceed LTHR noting it's a lagging indicator that takes minutes to catch up with effort. One day a week is sufficient.

Exercise as hard as you can without feeling your muscles, breathing becoming rhythmic, and conversation not flowing. That’s your aerobic threshold (AeT), VT1, and LT1. You could average that over 5 hours with an even effort split between halves. Exercise below that will do the most to lift it. Mark Allen set his 2:40 Ironman marathon split record which stood for decades after doing that, initially dropping his training pace to 8:15 miles with performance improving over a year to 5:20 at the same 155 bpm heart rate.

Apply the same motivation which gets you through hard days to recovery. Use a heart rate monitor to make it easier. I was so proud when I first averaged 100 bpm on rest week rides.

Add a fast (perhaps group) tempo ride for fun and not short ride on the weekend to see different scenery.

Enjoy!

randallr

One question - is your hunger protein hunger? Are you getting enough of that?

Digger Goreman

... seriously... get your potassium from one or two bananas after a ride....

Not to gain say the other advice, mind you....

bruce19

You might want to try CBD salve to see if that helps. Hammer Nutrition sells it but it isn't cheap.

Digger Goreman

Arnica is my goto for muscle and bruise relief. Stalk the Manager's Specials at Kroger and it's reasonable....

wolfchild

Snake oil remedies like creams, slaves, supplements are just an expensive Band-Aid solution which only provides a temporary relief and doesn't get to the root of the problem. You don't want to get hooked on that stuff...The best solution for OP is to modify and make changes to his training routine and get proper nutrition. Spend your money on good nutrition instead of wasting your money on bull**** snake oil remedies and supplements.

bruce19

Sorry but CBD salve does have a positive effect.

Digger Goreman

And arnica is plant based....

wolfchild

It may provide temporary relief and mask the symptoms....but it won't actually correct the problems which are the result of overtraining or inadequate nutrition.

Tulok

You’re definitely over training. Ride to work at 6mph, and give yourself at least 2 full days (3-4 likely better) between a swim and a run.

Or drive to work, cycle hard at the beginning of the week. And swim or run at the end of the week.

More time off + riding extra hard when you do occasionally train = you get faster faster.

KraneXL

Well saves and cream which will only cover the pain, maybe? But this may actually be the best time for supplements. In fact, one of the first reasons for slow recover can be nutritional deficiency. But regardless of the cause he definitely needs to take 2-3 day off from riding -- or any physical activity for that matter.