Do you hit a brick wall some days?

[jimnobob]

I've been riding every other day over the hols and been feeling fit and fresh with my lap times (at manly dam) being consistently fast. I started back at work this week and had my first early morning ride yesterday but my legs were just not having any of it. I wanted to blast out some faster than normal lap times but instead found myself going much slower than normal.

I didn't have breakfast but did knock back a hammer gel before getting on the bike. But it felt like my body was just not up for it. Do others find this happening occasionally? Any ideas what can cause it?

 

[willsy01]

Were you having brekky over the holidays?

 

[jimnobob]

I was generally getting out later in the day so had eaten previously. But before the hols this was my regular routine so quite used to a ride without brekky and just a gel.

 

[proph]

If you work in an air-conditioned office you could be dehydrated and having a gel would not help as you need about 400mL of water for the body to process the gel. Also did you warm up and do some stretches? This is important; if your job involves long hours in a chair your muscles would tighten up and with a reduction in water intake would easily account for a poor performance. Just my two cents.....oh and lack of sleep would effect performance. Hope this helps.

 

[spikenet]

Breakfast, hammer gel does not make!

I ride with some guys that subscribe to the "starvation" method of morning rides.. Bloody rediculous if you ask me, your body needs fuel to operate but its always a good laugh when they bonk.. and they always do
Ya cant beat a 4 egg omlette to get the day started!

 

[bear the bear]

I ride with some guys that subscribe to the "starvation" method of morning rides.. Bloody rediculous if you ask me

2x cups of black coffee with sugar and I'm good for 3hrs....but then again we bears are know for our "extra" fuel stores

 

[Oddjob]

If you know your typical resting heart rate, check your heart rate when you get out of bed tomorrow morning. If it's elevated that's a sure sign you've overtrained and need a few days break.

As everyone else has mentioned it could simply be a lack of breakfast.

The earlier start might be clashing with your diurnal rythm so you might just have to tough out a few more early starts.

 

[cgrade]

I've always found it takes a couple of weeks to get back in the swing of early morning exercise after taking a break.

I generally don't eat before going out in the morning. I tried a gel once or twice but found (not all that suprisingly) that it last about 15 mins and then I felt much worse than if I'd eaten nothing at all.

 

[Pizzaz]

Advice I had from a nutritionist is that food right before you head out in the morning is not much use - even stuff like cereal takes a good hour or so to digest and get converted into something that your body will recognise as energy... those early morning starts that we know and love are brought to you by dinner the night before...

For longer morning rides I have a couple of strawberries (or energy drink) just to start the metabolism and then have something else at about the 45 min mark (up n go is surprisingly good...) which stops me bonking at the 1 1/2 hr mark. If I look at my week, flat days are pretty easy in hindsight to recognise... usually a combination of hard training and not eating enough to compensate!

I think it was Greg LeMond who says there is no such thing as overtraining.... just undereating!

 

[jimnobob]

Thanks Pizzaz, your comments are ringing some bells. Starting back at work has coincided with me eating more healthily in order to lose a few kilos over the next month or two. I'm still eating well but have cut back on a few of those extra helpings and snacks. I didn't think it would have such an impact but I'll try a few changes in the diet and see what impact it has on performance.

 

[Pizzaz]

Yeah, I started back into training (both kms and diet ) this week - felt like death warmed up Wednesday... cause was 3 1/2 hrs (over 2 sessions) on the bike and eating 'healthy' - i.e. no snacks and not the carb-a-thon of the holidays... resut was -450 calories for the day... not good.

 

[jmcavoy]

I've always found it takes a couple of weeks to get back in the swing of early morning exercise after taking a break.

I am the same, last week I started training again after a month off and I just started feeling good yesterday, this is pretty normal for me too, I never feel awesome after a break, but after a week or so, the power is back and I'm feeling great, so that could be part of it.

Advice I had from a nutritionist is that food right before you head out in the morning is not much use
I think it was Greg LeMond who says there is no such thing as overtraining.... just undereating!

Absolutely, breaky immediately before excercise, especially if the session is less than 90mins is a waste of time, your body can't instantly digest it after all (if yours can, I want your stomach!). You need to eat 2-3 hrs before the session, but thats hard for an early morning ride, so skipping is fine, so long as you chuck in some easily digested carbs, like sports drink or a gel as you are.

So I say give it a few days, the form will come back.

PS: Did you actually take a break though? How many hours have you been doing each week for the last 6 weeks and how hard have those weeks been (if you can list each week individually)?

 

[jimnobob]

Did you actually take a break though?

I didn't take a break except from work . During the hols I actually increased the amount I was riding. I normally do about 50-60km off road and for the last few weeks have been doing about 100km.

So I can only put this down to diet, sleep deprivation (yes, I have a baby that keeps me awake some nights), biorhythms, or just the change in routine. The biggest 2 variables are diet and routine. My guess is diet at this stage.

 

[jimnobob]

I'm back to eating as I did before (where are those biscuits?) and went out again this morning to see if performance was back to normal. The only other noticeable difference was the weather as it was nice and cool this morning - perfect. And the baby did her best to disrupt my sleep again so that remains a constant .

The result was I was a good 10%+ faster than last week and knocked out a new personal best round the dam. So very pleased with that.

If nothing else it's been interesting to see how much diet can impact upon performance. I think I also underestimate just how much the temperature slows you down when you start to overheat. Last week was definitely warmer and much more humid.

Yum... tim tams.

 

[Optimus]

After the 24 Solo Nationals in Canberra in Easter last year where my body stopped processing food (not unheard of in 24 hour racing), my coach gave me early morning sessions where the only thing I could have was a glass of fruit juice before heading out (the reason had something with the liver wanting/needing some glucose to get it started) and not having anything other than water on the 2 to 3 hour rides. We were trying to teach my body to use body fat as a fairly primary source of fuel as in the 6 months of training in the lead up to the race I had always been eating as if I was racing (1g of carb/kg/hr). For the first couple of weeks I would suffer but eventually warmed to the idea until I stopped training and went back to eating before riding to which I fell back in love with.

So in summary, agree with some of the other posts in that having something small before a ride of over one to two hours (depending on exertion rates).

 

[Bjorn]

Pizzaz is spot on, when you punch out an early morning ride you are burning last nights dinner.
I go out most mornings for between 45 minutes to an hour and a half on no more than a decent sized glass of water and my multi-vitamin. I don't carry any food, just a 500ml bottle of water. Over those shorter rides there is not time for your body to process anything of value.
If it was a race start or long ride at the same time (6:30am) I'd be up and eating at 5am with a combination of complex and simple carbs.
I used to believe I couldn't function at a high level without a good feed before hand. The reality is that your body diverts blood that could be feeding your muscles to the stomach area for digestion. So for a short session you are actually handicapping yourself by eating.
Feel free to violently disagree with me.

 

[jimnobob]

So any thoughts about the benefits of having a gel before going out on a ride in the morning? My mid-week ride normally lasts for an hour and a quarter and is pretty intensive so I've always assumed that I need this to ensure I don't flag towards the end.

Or to put it another way... how long does your ride need to be before you need to start taking gels to avoid the energy crash?

 

[bforblack]

eating and eatin'

For my two cents Bjorn is spot on - the food doesn't count until the hour mark. After that, I look at it in blocks to put together riding and food hour after hour. You need to be aware what is coming up and I just can't handle gels until the final two or three hours. Good luck on the sleeping too - think that is a HUGE one for you. Good post.

 

[thargs]

Getting enough sleep is a big thing for me. Not enough I lose power fast in rides and find my limit quickly. Sleep well and I can blast through the next days training.

I also find that during holidays I do better than when back at work. Depending on what type of work and person you are, anxiety levels are higher when working and for me that takes away energy and sometimes a good nights sleep.

For food - was never a breakfast person so I can just ram down a muesli bar and wont eat until at least 1 to 1.5 hours later. If I eat right on the ride, my recovery for the rest of the day is far far better.

 

[Bjorn]

For food - was never a breakfast person so I can just ram down a muesli bar and wont eat until at least 1 to 1.5 hours later. If I eat right on the ride, my recovery for the rest of the day is far far better.

I'm going to sound like your mum here, breakfast is the most important meal of your day. It sets you up for day, anything after a couple of hours of riding will be powered by your morning meal. If you want to do better than you are already doing start thinking about a good breakfast.
"Eating breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper is the secret to good health."
Unfortunately I tend to eat breakfast like a pig, lunch like a pig and dinner like a pig.