Recovery Rides

[WoodyUpstate]

This year I'm riding "recovery rides" where I would have taken a day(s) off in past years.

I'm keeping my HR in zone 1, avoiding the big hills best I can, and limiting myself to the little ring exclusively. I'm keeping these rides to 60-90 minutes.

The psychological benefits have been as great as the physical benefits. Riding for fun, taking flat routes and enjoying the scenery.

I'm wondering if there's any concensus on the length of recovery rides. Not distance, but, rather time duration.

[Guest]

60- 90 minutes on a recovery ride seems a bit excessive.

I would tend to limit a recovery ride to 45- 60 minutes. Longer rides will just tire the legs, despite the lower heart rates and defeat the purpose of the recovery ride.

Koffee

[Chris L]

I've done recovery rides of several hours in duration in the past. The main thing is to go easier on the muscles as well as the heart-rate (which I don't bother monitoring properly anyway).

[Pat]

I agree Chris. I also have done long recovery rides. The main thing to watch isn't so much time or distance but your exertion level. As long as you keep the exertion level no more then a mild medium level, you should do ok as long as you don't go out and ride a century or something. But I have done 50 mile recovery rides and they work. But remember my normal rides are that distance. If you nomrally ride say 20 miles, doing a 50 mile recovery ride would be nuts.

[nathank]

i think in the pure sense of the idea - riding ONLY for the purpose of helping recovery - i think Koffee is right: that 45-60 minutes is better.

BUT, i have had success this year with doing 30-90 minute or even longer "recovery" rides on my "off" or "rest" days. i generally ride b/c 1) i NEED to ride for transportation or 2) i simply WANT to ride for personal reasons - just to be on the bike b/c i like it.

in years past i used to either a) ride normal for my commuting on my "rest" days (not good) or b) skip my ride altogether. this year i continue to ride for transportation (and b/c i love to be on the bike) but FORCE myself to ride slowly. i have found it was difficult for me to "learn" to take the discipline not to take chase when someone passes or when i come to a hill --- now i just shift down and spin and i have been very happy with the results.

this year i have also started using my "rest" or "low-intensity" days as times to ride with less experienced rides and lead beginners groups - that way i DO NOT allow myself to go fast, so it also works well for the slower riders (i'm one of those who usually pushes ALL the time - i have to "work" on it to go slow)

so if you are doing it MERELY for the recovery aspect, keep it short, but if you have a reason/want to make it a little longer, it should work almost as well...

[nathank]

pat posted while i was typing...

yes, good point about recovery being BOTH considerably less distance/time and less intensity.

when i am very fit during the summer, i can do a "recovery" ride that at the beginning of the season might be a hard ride --- for example i just got back from a 2 week mountain biking trip in the Alps of France/Italy and my recovery days i would *only* ride like 700 meters of vertical (2300 ft) and 60km (38 miles) b/c on my training days i was riding 3 to 4 times that also at HIGH intensity.

the recovery needs to be something that is very EASY for your body and doesn't tax it at all, so the difficuly/intensity is relative to your level of fitness/training.

[SamDaBikinMan]

I am with the 45-60 minute crowd here. Most important to me is to try and ride a pace that normally would seem like a waste of my time. No burn! Just fun and slow.


I do not worry about cadence or heartrate I just make sure I am going very easy.