recuperating after long rides

marcusww

Have been cycling a couple of years and regularly do 15 - 30 mile hilly rides with no problems. Occasionally I do club rides 40 - 60 miles and sportives up to 100 miles. I mostly put decent effort into rides. The problem is once back home I am really fatigued which overflows into the next day. I have tried eating lots / drinking recovery drinks etc. but this never stops the tiredness and fatigue. - Is it a matter of training and resting or is there any specific advice on recuperating?

slowbike

try an easy spin ... forget the GPS - just ride easy...

Hollow-legs

Not really answering your question ,but i have the same problem after doing a sufferfest video on trainerroad ,it kills me for a couple of days :?
But i can ride 50-60 miles and have no fatigue that night or the next day ,at the worst a little leg ache !
I generally learned that i must drink plenty of water ,eat well on the bike and pace myself better .
When i get in i have food or recovery shake within 20 minutes ,then more food ,a few stretching excercises ,then a hot bath.

As for the sufferfest sessions i do not take as much post ride /session time to recover ,i do not do the above ...as i feel it is only a 1 hour turbo session .but i should ,as its very high intensity.

I am 48 ,78 kg

Jules Winnfield

How often do you ride and just how much do you 'push' yourself when you are out? If you are just a once a week rider then maybe your fitness is just not up to scratch. Do you train with a Heart rate monitor? I have been using one now for the past 3 months and being able to train in different zones relative to my own maximum heart rate has seen my performance on the bike improve in leaps and bounds. What is your eating routine after a ride? The first hour after a ride.... The 'Golden Hour' the experts call it..... is the most important time to get nurishment back into your system. When I've been out, the first thing I do after getting changed is get protein down my neck. That will be a full tin of sardines on toast, or a full tin of tuna straight out of the tin. I believe that it's protein that will mop up the lactic acid built up in your muscles from training. As you know lactic acid is why your legs ache the day after a hard ride if you haven't eaten properly as soon as you get off the bike.

To stop yourself feeling tired, you need to flood your body with carbs. When you finish a hard ride your body will be low on blood glucose and will be ready to replenish its glycogen stores but it will not have the glucose it needs to make glycogen. Simple carbohydrates that release glucose quickly which in turns makes glycogen which gives you energy is what you need to consume. If you watch any cycling on TV, this is why the pros in stage races, as soon as they past the finish line, can be seen downing a can of coke. It's full of sugar yes and generally it's nasty but the glucose in it is what their body needs to fuel itself in preperation for the next days stage.

Jules Winnfield

I will also add, do you eat whilst on the bike? If you are doing any rides of more than 90 minutes, then you really need to fuel your body with carbs to give yourself the energy to sufficiently turn the pedals. Your liver and muscles can only store enough glycogen to fuel your body for 90 minutes of exercise. If you are not eating on the bike and you are doing mileage of 40-60 miles on a club run, at a guess I would say you are on the bike between 2.5 - 4 hours and the fatigue you are experiencing could be likened to a 'bonk'. 30-60 grams of carbs per hour for rides lasting 2 hours or more is what you need to eat. Start eating carbs at this rate a hour after you have started your ride.

hypster

Hollow-legs wrote:

Not really answering your question ,but i have the same problem after doing a sufferfest video on trainerroad ,it kills me for a couple of days :?
But i can ride 50-60 miles and have no fatigue that night or the next day ,at the worst a little leg ache !
I generally learned that i must drink plenty of water ,eat well on the bike and pace myself better .
When i get in i have food or recovery shake within 20 minutes ,then more food ,a few stretching excercises ,then a hot bath.

As for the sufferfest sessions i do not take as much post ride /session time to recover ,i do not do the above ...as i feel it is only a 1 hour turbo session .but i should ,as its very high intensity.

I am 48 ,78 kg

You might want to re-think the hot bath. A lot of pro athletes these days use ice baths after a workout which should tell you something. Also, drinking too much is not beneficial to performance but I haven't seen anything to say it affects recovery either way other than it takes much longer to get over over-hydration rather than under-hydration so maybe you are prolonging your recovery. Drink to thirst is the best advice rather than because you think you should.

JayKosta

Perhaps you 'over-do' on the days that you do ride - that would account for the fatigue. It sounds like your 'rest and recovery' regime is ok.

If your schedule allows you to ride more frequently, then REDUCE the effort. That should prevent the need for extended rest and recovery, so you can ride more often and do more miles per week/month. Doing more frequent rides will increase your base endurance. This type of training will allow the effort level per ride to increase slowly, while still being able to ride frequently.

If frequent outdoor riding is not possible, then try some other forms of aerobic training. Running, treadmill, bike trainer, climbing stairs, step-bench, etc.

Jay Kosta
Endwell NY USA

Stalin

hypster wrote:

Hollow-legs wrote:

Not really answering your question ,but i have the same problem after doing a sufferfest video on trainerroad ,it kills me for a couple of days :?
But i can ride 50-60 miles and have no fatigue that night or the next day ,at the worst a little leg ache !
I generally learned that i must drink plenty of water ,eat well on the bike and pace myself better .
When i get in i have food or recovery shake within 20 minutes ,then more food ,a few stretching excercises ,then a hot bath.

As for the sufferfest sessions i do not take as much post ride /session time to recover ,i do not do the above ...as i feel it is only a 1 hour turbo session .but i should ,as its very high intensity.

I am 48 ,78 kg

You might want to re-think the hot bath. A lot of pro athletes these days use ice baths after a workout which should tell you something. Also, drinking too much is not beneficial to performance but I haven't seen anything to say it affects recovery either way other than it takes much longer to get over over-hydration rather than under-hydration so maybe you are prolonging your recovery. Drink to thirst is the best advice rather than because you think you should.

They used to believe ice cold baths increased sperm count too.

marcusww

Jules Winnfield wrote:

I will also add, do you eat whilst on the bike? If you are doing any rides of more than 90 minutes, then you really need to fuel your body with carbs to give yourself the energy to sufficiently turn the pedals. Your liver and muscles can only store enough glycogen to fuel your body for 90 minutes of exercise. If you are not eating on the bike and you are doing mileage of 40-60 miles on a club run, at a guess I would say you are on the bike between 2.5 - 4 hours and the fatigue you are experiencing could be likened to a 'bonk'. 30-60 grams of carbs per hour for rides lasting 2 hours or more is what you need to eat. Start eating carbs at this rate a hour after you have started your ride.

Thanks in BST I ride 2/3 times per week, 15-30 miles in the week and a longer one on the Sunday club run and push most of the time, On hills maybe 85 - 95% of max HR, ive stopped using a HRM as I always backed off when seeing the high figures. But with quite a big build I fear I maybe under doing the carbs. Just an example of my build and ride - I am 6,2" 100kg and did the 75 mile wiggle Bournmouth last Saturday at 17.8mph average - mostly did high 5 gels but maybe not enough and had banana and flapjack at the food stops, the next day worked all day in the Garden and needless to say Monday I was knackered!

wavefront

Don't under estimate gardening!!! I train 12-14 hrs a week and have recently started trying to landscape the garden of a weekend, even just 3-4 hrs on both days - it's pushed me over the edge and I've become so much more tired, that it is now affecting my training. I don't think it's conducive to recovery, so try and take it easy!!

Smithster

wavefront wrote:

Don't under estimate gardening!!! I train 12-14 hrs a week and have recently started trying to landscape the garden of a weekend, even just 3-4 hrs on both days - it's pushed me over the edge and I've become so much more tired, that it is now affecting my training. I don't think it's conducive to recovery, so try and take it easy!!

I can vouch for that.

Being a full time gardener/landscaper. I can confirm that doing a 100 miler yesterday, then digging over and levelling 21 square metres of soil today in preparation for laying a lawn, does not help with recovery!

In fact some days it's easier out on the bike, than it is when I'm grafting on a current project.