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I’ve recently upped my training intensity in Preparation for the racing season and it’s ruining me. I’m not putting in huge miles by any means, last week was 3 x hard interval sessions and 2 medium length road rides at moderate pace (zone 2/3), yet im waking up at the end of the week completely broken. My entire body aches, im developing little niggling pains that won’t go away, and I generally feel battered
I don’t feel worn down, im not ill, and im taking a rest week every month, but my body just can’t seem to deal with it
I’m 47 next month, so not ancient, and im building on an already pretty decent level of fitness. It’s just I can’t seem to cope with any more than about 5 hrs a week of training
Any tips on how to cope better? I’m doing all the post ride stretching, my diet is ok. I’ve had a bike fit…
Ta
I wouldn't be fitting 3 hard interval sessions into 5h, at least not until was comfortable with 2. I'm currently running about 8-10h a week and only 1-2 of those are hard.
How much sleep are you getting?
Sorry for clarity it’s 3 interval sessions in 8.5 hrs last week. 5-6 hrs is usually the tipping point however, but that would only include a couple of interval sessions
I get about 7-8 hrs a night sleep
Good quality Omega 3 fish oil daily is good for muscle aches etc. As per, erm, googles...
https://www.runnersworld.com/news/a27207865/fish-oil-reduces-muscle-soreness/
It's not going to revolutionise your life, but it might help a little. Hydration makes a big difference ime, especially post session, also, warming down with some very gentle, high-ish cadence spinning works for me.
Three hard interval session might be too much. Maybe go down to two per week, with a couple of days between each and see if that improves things?
I think it depends what level you are actually coming from - what did you do before 3 intervals and 2 rides? I turned 51 in January and over the last few years have had to change my approach quite significantly. Gone are the days where I can ramp intensity quickly, now I have to very much manage my efforts to allow for a body that takes longer to respond to training.
Before I made this change I was constantly picking up niggling injuries that would take weeks or months to heal and I'd go backwards. For example, I hadn't run for a year or so (due to injury) so started off what I thought was slowly with a few weeks of 2-3k, then a few more of 4-6k, then in one week I did 2 10-11k off roaders and injured myself again. This was all coming from a decent base fitness with lots of cycling and swimming.
I've recently joined a gym and am doing a fair amount of strength and core work to try to help avoid injuries.
At 47 it's possible you're at that stage. End of the day, whatever age you must listen to your body and if you ache, feel battered, and are picking up niggles then I'd say you are over doing it.
Edit: To BWD's point ^^^ I've also started taking glucosamine along with a multi-vitamin. My knees and ankles are pretty shot and apparently glucosamine is helpful. Only a couple of weeks in so too early to tell yet.
Definitely feeling my age even though I'm probably fitter than I have been in years.
Realised I've wasted a good 20 years working and waiting to ride instead of just riding. Looking for more events to do now.
As asked - how much sleep are you getting? Are you eating properly? How much stretching are you doing? How busy are you with other things as well?
As per my reply 7-8 hrs sleep a night, plenty of stretching post exercise
I’ll pay more attention to the hydration element as I don’t drink nearly enough
I’m not sure there’s mega good evidence for stretching. Even strength training is pretty mixed. Sleep is a biggy of course.
The biggest red herring for me is that, the latest thinking from Seiler etc has everything above Z2 causing an autonomic nervous system response and thus stress.
3 interval sessions plus 2 days up into Z3 is effectively 5x ‘hard’ days by that definition.
Intensity maintenance is important as you age but I’d swap out at least two if not three of those sessions for <Z2.
Dylan Johnson created a good graphic that Seiler nicked for his talk at Oxford where he showed how 80/20 by intensity can still be bad if it’s by time in zone. You could do 80mins of Z1 and 20 mins of threshold every day and clearly dig yourself a very big hole.
Basically, it just sounds like the old mantra. Make your easy days easier so your hard days can be harder 😀
Are you consuming enough protein? With age it's also worth supplementing with leucine (or BCAAs, which combine leucine, isoleucine & valine).
Two approaches to training:
1. Pain is My Friend: The only way to get better is to stress your body as hard as you can. This works when you are young and don't care about being a cripple when you are old.
2. Listen to Your Body: Pain means that your body is injured and needs time to heal. If you were silly enough to use approach #1 when you were young, you'll find that, when you're 50, bending over to pick up a bag of groceries will require two weeks of recovery time.
I resemble #2
I saw that CBD gummies were suggested to be good for recovery??
Yoga helps with my aches and pains, you tube yoga for cyclists.
Don't do 3 high intensity sessions a week, then...
Also - use recovery drink with ribose in it.