loss of fitness

[r0bbti]

Does anyone know how quickly you lose your fitness?
I was doing well, increasing the miles to 600/month, getting a bit faster, for a couple of months, then NO cycling at all for about 3weeks now due to the weather. I hate the gym/turbo/spin etc so have done nothing really. Am I back to square one, or do all those miles in Sept/Oct/Nov count for anything? How long would it take to lose evrything you had worked so hard for!!

 

[lukesdad]

You would lose fitness over alay off as you describe, but the good news is you ll get it back very quickly, as long as you dont leave it too long.

 

[r0bbti]

Do you mean that the fitter you were before a lay-off, the quicker you regain fitness? Someone told me once that if you did no exercise for 4weeks, you effectively had to start again to regain fitness. Just feel a bit demoralised , remembering the initial slog in August to start cycling.

 

[Crackle]

I don't know if it's true but I was once told you lose it three times faster than you gain it. However, with three months behind you, you'll gain it back faster and suffer less. Again just a view, I don't know the truth of it and suspect it's also an individual thing too.

 

[lukesdad]

Exactly. They re probably talking about race fitness or something similar. When you get somwhere near to your ultimate fitness level any break of even a short time you would need to restart the programme, but this is not what you are looking to do at the moment I assume, remember there are allways different levels and interpretations of fitness. If they are about Bill or Jimbo may go into it a little more theoretically for you.

 

[MacB]

Yep, sounds like LD has it there, I don't think these fitness rulings are the same for mortals and the generally less fit. This time last year 2 miles on the bike saw me a sweating wreck and there was a local hill I had to push on. I've hardly ridden for 3 months but can go out and do 25ish miles with no ill effect. The hill I struggled on I was doing in the Summer in a gear around 70" now I might need around 55". I'm down by about 1.5mph but am also running spiked Winter tyres. My rough guestimation is that it will take me 4 weeks to get to a level that took me 6 months to reach originally. But we won;t know until my Cyclogs log tells the tale

I'm sure there's a mental aspect to it as well, just knowing that you have done it somehow makes it easier. When I started out the newness, and lack of confidence, made it all seem so much harder.

 

[Bill Gates]

The answer is it all depends on your level of fitness at the time you stopped training.

For those riders who train all year round and race, if they stopped for say 3 months then it is estimated they would lose half of their aerobic fitness in that time. On the other hand if you started from scratch and trained for 8 weeks then stopped you would lose all of your aerobic fitness within the next 8 weeks.

If you can't get out on the bike then you should do something else to get the heart rate up such as running or swimming or use the turbo. IMO the mistake that most people make is to measure your training levels in terms of miles or hours on the bike. IMO 2-3 hours high quality training a week, (e.g. LT 2 x 20 minutes) on the turbo or rollers, will more than keep you ticking over during periods of bad weather conditions.

This sort of training is best done every other day; so hard one day then next day easy or nothing at all. If it feels too hard then ride easy as the body may not have recovered sufficiently. I also bung in a couple of hours of gym work.

I would always compare this situation with when I was tapering for a particular race. To taper you reduce the mileage and then enhance the quality of the training to produce the performance you want. The same principle applies when you can't get on the bike in the winter. Of course you need the base mileage but training your top end in the warm can be very beneficial as you will notice the next time you ride.

 

[Hont]

I don't know if it's true but I was once told you lose it three times faster than you gain it.

I've heard that too.

3 weeks doing absolutely nothing will result in a noticeable loss of fitness. I know what you mean re. Turbo not being much fun but Bill Gates is right you would benefit from some high quality short workouts. I spent most of one winter just doing weights and sprint intervals. No workout was longer than 40 minutes and I lost no top-end speed only a bit of endurance.

 

[karen.488walker]

have just done my 1st couple of runs after a 4 week + break. The 1st was a disaster, the 2nd a bit better but harder work. I think you can do more returning even if you have lost fitness because you know you can do it now because you've done it before and just push yourself harder. If that makes any sense?

 

[karen.488walker]

have just done my 1st couple of runs after a 4 week + break. The 1st was a disaster, the 2nd a bit better but harder work. I think you can do more returning even if you have lost fitness because you know you can do it now because you've done it before and just push yourself harder. If that makes any sense?

 

[Bill Gates]

have just done my 1st couple of runs after a 4 week + break. The 1st was a disaster, the 2nd a bit better but harder work. I think you can do more returning even if you have lost fitness because you know you can do it now because you've done it before and just push yourself harder. If that makes any sense?

You will have lost fitness nonetheless. It's still worth building it up rather than going hard too quickly. That fitness goal you're after won't be gotten any quicker.

 

[Bill Gates]

have just done my 1st couple of runs after a 4 week + break. The 1st was a disaster, the 2nd a bit better but harder work. I think you can do more returning even if you have lost fitness because you know you can do it now because you've done it before and just push yourself harder. If that makes any sense?

You will have lost fitness nonetheless. It's still worth building it up rather than going hard too quickly. That fitness goal you're after won't be gotten any quicker.

 

[Bodhbh]

I've been off around 10 weeks, first with hernia op and then the inclement weather. I was doing about 250miles a week previous, but during the off have pretty much done nothing cept walking to and from work. Had my first run yesterday, 25-30 miles or so taking it easy. Clearly lost a lot of strength and stamina in my legs, lungs burning a bit, but not totally stiff today and wasn't too bad once got going.

Certainly not lost it all, was easier than when I first got on a bike as an adult a couple of yrs back. Will start communting again next week at least 3 days/week or so, build up longer runs at weekend, think will be come back to where I was soon enough, in time for the good weather anyhow.

 

[Bodhbh]

I've been off around 10 weeks, first with hernia op and then the inclement weather. I was doing about 250miles a week previous, but during the off have pretty much done nothing cept walking to and from work. Had my first run yesterday, 25-30 miles or so taking it easy. Clearly lost a lot of strength and stamina in my legs, lungs burning a bit, but not totally stiff today and wasn't too bad once got going.

Certainly not lost it all, was easier than when I first got on a bike as an adult a couple of yrs back. Will start communting again next week at least 3 days/week or so, build up longer runs at weekend, think will be come back to where I was soon enough, in time for the good weather anyhow.

 

[Bodhbh]

I've been off around 10 weeks, first with hernia op and then the inclement weather. I was doing about 250miles a week previous, but during the off have pretty much done nothing cept walking to and from work. Had my first run yesterday, 25-30 miles or so taking it easy. Clearly lost a lot of strength and stamina in my legs, lungs burning a bit, but not totally stiff today and wasn't too bad once got going.

Certainly not lost it all, was easier than when I first got on a bike as an adult a couple of yrs back. Will start communting again next week at least 3 days/week or so, build up longer runs at weekend, think will be come back to where I was soon enough, in time for the good weather anyhow.