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How much fitness can you lose in a month...

I've told my sorry tale of dropping sideways off Ventoux but seek advice on how to address my upcoming event.

The trip up Ventoux was on 13th July with decent base miles and much more climbing in the tank than ever, I made it up quite comfortably and have do e multiple 100 mile events before.

Now, I have the Manchester 100 for Christie's due on 4th September and obviously had an extended period off the bike. How difficult am I likely to find it? How much fitness do you think you'd lose per week.

First fortnight I managed around 35 miles on the turbo (lightly spinning the fibula fracture and whilst clavicle was rather broken and out of place). Have managed 20 miles on the turbo in one hit this week (operation on shoulder last Monday) and as I'm coming off the painkillers hope for more.

Should I keep the activities short and frequent?
Should I try and get a 50 plus in before the event, and if so how close?
Any tips on returning without a fully functioning shoulder?
Should I give up on the idea?

All feedback/experience greatly appreciated!

If you're new please join in and if you have questions pop them below and the forum regulars will answer as best we can.

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13 comments

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alansmurphy | 6 years ago
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Give me a wave as you see me struggle, there'll be 2 of us wearing Stoke style red and white stripes  1

One co-pilot is super cautious and won't do the first couple of hours North of 13.5mph average, I may be well pleased to hang in his wheel  1

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john1r1simmons | 6 years ago
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I broke my collar bone end of December. and I am 52 years old, I think age is a factor.  I had about 8 weeks of arm in sling and problems with mobility etc afterwards. At first I was doing regular spin bike/turbo sessions and was limited in how much I could do before pain set in, but I tried to exercise at least 3 times a week.  After about 5 weeks I had to stop the pain was just getting too much and I had 3 weeks of no cycling. I avoided pain killers so I could judge when to stop exercise. 

After about 8 weeks I could take the sling off and it had sort of stuck together and I could start to spin on turbo again but I had arm mobility and strength issues, the rotator cuff was damaged and I had a frozen shoulder.  With physio and exercises I went back out on the road after 12 weeks. FTP was down and I had to un-slam the stem. The TT bike was impossible to ride. 

I managed the tour of Ayrshire 4 months after accident, but to be honest the arm was not correct and after 3 hours on the bike the arm was useless, strength and ability to cope with bumps in the road surface being the issue. Just after this I started to ride the TT bike again, but with my elbows sticking out. Another month I was able to get back into my old riding position and equal my personal best, one month later I took 20 seconds off my 10 mile pace. 

What does all that say, I think the legs came back fairly well but the ability of my arm to cope with road shocks and bending was as much of an issue. Pretty well the recovery time matched the time off the bike. It probably depends on the injury. The 1st assessment was 6 months off the bike and probably an op as I had over 1.5cm of gaps between the bones and 3 bits of bone L. But after 2 weeks it sort of settled down and after about 8 it was gummed together again. I was told that was a little bit slow for the average collar bone but quick for the level of damage, the main bit of good luck was it looked to re-align itself well while strapped. The bad news was the muscle and capsule damage. 8 months on the arm is OK for normal life but still not correct in terms of movement. Will it be good enough for cyclocross?

If your arm feels good go for it. Just check out what sort of pain is muscle and ok and what is coming from bone damage.    

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alansmurphy | 6 years ago
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Serg, not a problem, will be on my disk brake commuter with cheat brakes so bad bar tape  1

Good thinking Check, being diabetic I certainly know the affect of the body breaking down the muscles. Not been eating too much with the painkillers and lack of action, will have to increase carbs and protein over the next fortnight...

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check12 | 6 years ago
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Keep having protein with every meal to stop your body chowing down on your muscles whilst you are off the bike. Maybe British cycling strength routine also. 

High interval training as has been said if you can but sounds like that could be problematic. 

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alansmurphy | 6 years ago
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Kapel, this is my 5th or 6th go at it and last year was on single speed, this year was going to be on a Chopper. Quietly confident on the route and living near Nantwich have an escape if necessary  1

Di2 eek. Hoping that by keeping the legs spinning I will avoid that big crash downwards and still have 50 or 60 in the legs and the rest is drafting the mates, adrenaline, sponsorship etc.

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CXR94Di2 | 6 years ago
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I can give you an idea. In our club a young man joined the military services. He hasn't ridden for one month. Sunday he came out on a club run and after 14 miles went home. Now before he went into the forces, he was easily one of the best and strongest in our club. One month without cycling at the usual high intensity will see a significant drop off in fitness. The good news it comes back reasonably quickly. Personal experience having spent 16 weeks unable to walk at all, took me 3 months to get 90% fitness back and another year to get a further 5%

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Leviathan replied to CXR94Di2 | 6 years ago
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CXR94Di2 wrote:

I can give you an idea. In our club a young man joined the military services. He hasn't ridden for one month. Sunday he came out on a club run and after 14 miles went home. Now before he went into the forces, he was easily one of the best and strongest in our club. One month without cycling at the usual high intensity will see a significant drop off in fitness. The good news it comes back reasonably quickly. Personal experience having spent 16 weeks unable to walk at all, took me 3 months to get 90% fitness back and another year to get a further 5%

Or in other words he was dropped after 14 miles and went his own way. I really doubt he was unable to cycle further.

Alan, just ride. If you are coming back from injury, just make sure you are not damaging yourself, enjoy it as a comeback event and don't punish yourself for not being at your max. It is a bit of a season closer anyway. I bet you won't be the slowest person there even at 90% effort. (I'm doing the 100km and the only person I have to beat is me.2015)

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Kapelmuur | 6 years ago
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The Manchester 100 is flat, I did it last year as my first century ride at the age of 68, on an average of 100 miles a week, and found it easy - I'd never ridden more than 50 miles in one go before.

My experience as a frequently injured distance runner was that you don't lose much endurance in a month, particularly if stamina is your strong point.

Just take it easy, chat to the people around you and it will be over before you know.

 

 

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alansmurphy | 6 years ago
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Thanks all.

I was a commuter turned weekend warrior averaging 70 on a weekend and 25 in midweek. However in training (urgh I mean riding a bike) ahead of Ventoux I've been much more quality over quantity doubling climbing of any other year in just 6 months. Also started using HR Zones to try and increase periods I could be zones 5 and above and then how well I could recover in 3 and 4.

Am sort of retraining the brain as I'd always been a low cadence rider (73) so the turbo has enabled me to do some high spins without causing stress on the legs and working this in with the heart rate (mostly zones 3 to 4 with the odd push). Not having much used the turbo I imagine some of the discomfort is the heat and relentlessnes of it all.

Having been introduced to road with the miles mantra I was just worried that it may all fall to bits. Good to know that working hard in short regular bursts should do a good job.

Ssrgius, did you do anything like additional bar tape to help your wrists?

Thanks!

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sergius replied to alansmurphy | 6 years ago
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alansmurphy wrote:

Ssrgius, did you do anything like additional bar tape to help your wrists? Thanks!

 

No, I really like the bar tape on my best bike (though I have no idea what it is) and didn't want to mess with it.

The jarring over poor road surfaces was initially the worst part as you surmised, I found myself using the tops a fair bit to start with as that's less pressure on the wrists.  It was probably only painful for the first month give or take, certainly didn't cause me long term issues.

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sergius | 6 years ago
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I'm in reasonable shape to begin with, when I came off and broke both wrists in January I was limited to short exercise bike sessions for a couple of months.

 

It didn't feel particularly different to a normal winters' loss of fitness when I finally got back on the bike.  I always do less miles over the winter months anyway, I was back up to my normal 70 mile weekend jaunts within a couple of weeks.

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peted76 | 6 years ago
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And I'd keep the activites as hard as you can without causing any pain. It'll do you no good to delay healing because you needed to do 25miles over 15miles on a turbo.  Spin free and raise your HR, I'd suggest over and above any 'resistance based' wattage stuff. 

 

Prior to the event don't worry about covering distance, to me baseline miles are a 'want' not a 'need', just focus on HR training ramping it up and recovering your HR, the rest will take care of itself. 

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peted76 | 6 years ago
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No simple answer here. 

If you're a 'seasoned' cyclist ergo your body is used to training and cycling a lot - then the simple answer is - you won't loose much.

If you're a reletive newbie who's shot up the ladder of fitness like a hero - and you have a month of inactivity with zero workouts, then you'll know about it.  

And every shade of grey inbetween.. 

 

As I understand it, your heart sort of grows and gets stronger the fitter you get, with that you pump more blood more efficiently around your body and your muscles get more used to getting more blood and act accordingly.. with more oxygen and other sciencey stuff making you into a fuel chomping monster endurance athlete. You let that slide Clyde and it's all down hill from there...

However the good news is that 'science' also says you only need one 15min high intensity workout a week to keep form and fitness.

More good news! Common sense tells me that you'll be absolutley fine and stop worrying about it, you'll get from one end of the Manchester 100 to the other in some form regardless. 

 

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