Over-training / Volume v Intensity / Cadence

edd

I have been training on the bike fairly diligently for about four years now, doing about 10 hours a week. Though I didn't feel run down or unhealthy my legs were feeling a little heavy just walking around between rides. So I started taking Mondays off, usually did a 2 hr ride. This meant I was now off the bike Mondays/ Tuesdays and Friday/Saturday doing only three days a week. Funny thing is over the following three months my performance on the Sunday morning rides significantly improved.

Now if you're a young chap who recovers really quickly then this might seem weird but for us old guys managing recovery is very important.

I didn't think I was over-training before. I just felt with work and the everyday life crap it was too much of a physical drain. The improvement came I believe because on Wednesdays and Thursdays I was able to increase the intensity of the indoor interval work and on Sundays I was fully recovered and able to truly challenge myself again on the road.

I also increased the range of cadences I do intervals at from 75 to 85 range to 75 to 112 range.

I read somewhere that one should do most of their training over 90 rpm. I have noted on Sunday rides most weekend riders don't do this. A huge number push a big gear quite slowly. I believe this fatigues muscles at a more rapid a rate then high cadences which tend to challenge the heart and lungs a little more. So it follows on that intense high cadence intervals will be less fatiguing on the legs then low cadence intervals.

So to keep this in perspective… is a sixty year old cyclist riding three times a week at various intensities, once a 90 k over hilly terrain, twice 30 k intervals ( 160k a week ) doing enough training ?

Alex Simmons

That really depends on what you are training for. Enlighten us.

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edd

Mainly to stay on the green side of the grass …

Masters games in Sydney Oct 2009, not sure of the events, probably 25 k time trial, I suck at this by the way. Not that I'm slow, can whip a few young-ins, just there is probably 5000 sixty year old guys out there who could whip me, maybe none of them will show up ? never know ?

Romis

MTB riders usually push big gears, in fact. But I think that for non-professional it is hard to overtrain... because on a limited time schedule.

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edd

I didn't think MTB had big gears ?

Anyone can over-train, miss manage your training schedule so one has too many consecutive training sessions and inadequate recovery time and it happens, maybe not right away, but it will happen.

Alex Simmons

Then I'd suggest that with those hours, your training would need to be very focussed and you would need a fair amount of talent/pedigree to whip 60+ yo butt at Masters Games but at same time you could be reasonably competitive (aim for a PB), although it is not a major cycling championship, it is an overall games (all sorts of sports) so hard to know what the competition will really be like. It coincides with World Masters Track Championships which are on week or so before/after (I forget which way round), so there will be some enduros who might hang around for it and have some form.

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daveryanwyoming

Seeing improvements on your weekly hard rides doesn't necessarily mean your training is better. It may indicate increased freshness but those mini-tapers that yield weekly freshness often come at the expense of long term fitness gains.

Three training days a week or stated otherwise, four rest days a week, sounds awfully low in terms of encouraging fitness adaptations. Given your goals of riding well and setting PBs at the Master's Games I'd think seriously about adding at least a fourth day to your training week. I don't know your overall training blend, but if you're doing a lot of high end work then it could be a mid to high Tempo day to add training load without digging too deep a hole. There are an awful lot of masters athletes training four, five and six days a week but managing their loads appropriately. To paraphrase Lydiard, it's hard to compete with folks who ride an additional 150 training days per year.

It's great that you've seen improvement with some increased intensity and a bit more rest, just make sure you're not really seeing tapering and freshness at times when you should be building your training base. It's o.k. to plug along without having any superstar performances as you build power and base as long as you don't dig too deep a hole and burnout. An occasional taper to "come up for air" and perhaps to assess your progress with some testing is fine as long as you aren't in perpetual taper mode. It takes some faith, but if you build a deep base with steady progressive work you can taper for freshness during your competitive season or for big rides that are important to you.

Good luck,
Dave

thekgb

a couple more questions: what do those mid-week 30k workouts look like? are they SST/L4 or are they just noodling around at endurance level? VO2 efforts maybe? also, how long before you cut out that monday session did you see the benefit on the ride? And how long has the success lasted so far?

On a side note, in contrast to above, over-training is relative. just b/c you're a non-professional doesn't mean you can't overtrain. Overtraining has more to do with over-reaching, not recognizing it, and staying the course until your legs and lungs go flat. That can happen to a cat 5 or cat 1. Like DRW said: it's about managing the current workload and progressively building on it...if thats what you want. But if your goal is to keep doing what your doing on the sunday ride and it works, then it's hard to argue with success no matter how you got there?! the question is, will it last. that's where CTL comes into play. If the goal is the master's championships but you don't care how you place, then you can play with how much you're willing to invest in time/intensity to build up the workload to do better, etc...

but, then again, i'm not 60 and have no idea how it feels to recover at that age...but i hope i'm still riding as much as you do when i'm 60. best of luck.

edd

Mid week are indoor sessions and are intervals at max effort. Mix these up, all have a 20 min warm up and 5 min spin down, do micro intervals (15 x 40 sec work/20 sec recovery) or pyramid intervals (1 min work, 1 min recovery, 2 min work, 1 min recovery, 3 min work, 1 min recovery, 4 min work, 1 min recovery, 3 min work, 1 min recovery, 2 min work, 1 min recovery, 1 min work, 1 min recovery) or 10 x 1 min intervals or 5 x 3 min intervals. I would like to do longer intervals, 10 and 20 min, but class environment won't allow this.

On Sundays mornings. I have a road ride which inevitably is a mix of intensities and hill work. Sunday evening I do 1 hr of low intensity work.

I really need to spend more time on the road, work and other stuff prevents. in the next 18 months I'll figure something out, might even invest in a power meter.

thekgb

i have to imagine with that level of workout at those intensities you're probaby getting "just enough" fitness to keep up with the group on sundays. i would expect that if you tried to race a season and mix it up with harder groups it would be a challenge to sustain a full schedule given that your CTL is probably on the low-ish side compared to others who may be getting more of a base build. A PM would be a good idea if you really wanted to start quantifying your training more. But again, depends on your goals...

edd

I also have an indoor spin bike at home. I'm thinking I could do low intensity specific cadence work in the mornings for 30 min.

Not sure this will help me much ?? I use to commute on a bike 20 years ago when I was 40-ish. Even though I would punch it hard on the trip to work. It wasn't until I got a road bike and started doing 80-90k rides that my fitness improved.

The fitness industry has a saying (they have lots of sayings) you can train long or you can train hard. If you try to train long and hard you end not doing ether.

As Dave noted, I'm probably missing some volume base work. but I'm not sure on his take about mini tapers ? fully recovered is fully recovered, not fully recovered is not fully recovered. Compounding fatigue is a training technique but doing this as an ongoing training regime doesn't make sense to me.

In April last year I did a 9 day cycle tour with a recreational group of 1000 riders. Put some 27mm tyres on my road bike and that was all the prep I did. Most of the other riders had bigger gear spread and could just take it easy up the hills (lots of hill) I just caned it up the hills and past everyone I came across. Day five was a rest day, I could hardly walk, Legs were smashed. By day 7 I was in a groove but my overall power output was down, sort of comfortably numb.

daveryanwyoming

My point is that it's easy to confuse freshness and performance with long term fitness gains.

Everybody needs to come up for air occaisonally and rest on daily, weekly, montly and yearly time scales is necessary for improved fitness. I'm certainly not suggesting digging an infinitely deep or long training hole and riding yourself into the ground. Just that when you take it easier after a moderate to heavy training load you will feel strong. It doesn't mean that taking it easier is the best long term strategy, just that the increased freshness allows you to reap the rewards of your previous training. That's what we do when we peak for important events. But if you draw the conclusion that less training equals more fitness then you might be dissapointed in the long run.

Resting four days out of seven or more than half the training week is certainly unconventional and almost certainly not what your opponents are doing this time of year. If it's all the time you have then there's not much you can do about it but that doesn't sound like your situation. Everyone should manage their training load and I'm not suggesting you ride every day or at top intensities or spend all your time on the bike just that most athletes even age graders recover and train very well on a 5 day a week schedule. You might be the exception, but I'd be surprised if you will gain more fitness in the long run while only training 3 days a week. This is where a good coach can really help.

No offense intended and it's your goals and training load to manage but it's a very rare athlete that improves by resting for more days than they train.

Good luck,
Dave

edd

None taken, I'm listening, that's why I'm here. By-the-way what age group are you in Dave ?

daveryanwyoming

47 on my racing license.