yeamac 

I've been road cycling for 2 years now and since riding a double century in early November, I decided to take a little time off the bike -- almost 2 months of no riding. Prior to the double century I was doing rides of up to 140 mile rides about twice a month.

I am getting ready to get back into riding and would like a little feedback as to how much to start back into it -- should I start with short 15 mile rides and work my way up at no more than 10% each week, or can I start out doing longer rides, say 30-40 miles and increase from there? I certainly don't want to overtrain. This is the longest break I have taken from the bike in the past 2 years and don't know if I have enough "base" in me or if two months off the bike has wiped all my previous riding away.

Machka 

The "start with short rides and increase by 10% per week" advice is usually for newbie riders. Since you have recent experience, if you feel comfortable with longer distances, go for it. Just be sure to listen to your body and to ease up or take breaks when you think you need them.

sch

Unless you are close to retirement age, you should not lose more that 10-20% of your
conditioning in 2mo. You should have no trouble picking up 40-60mi rides and building
up to 80-100mi in a couple of months. When I raced, in my late 20s early 30s I would
take off from mid Nov to mid/late Jan and resume in earnest in Feb and be racing well
by April, out to 60-80mi.

Jim from Boston

I'm surprised that sch estimates only a 10 to 20% loss of conditioning over two months. Can he cite a reference? I can't, but here is a post I sent to a prior thread, "1 and 1/2 weeks off the bike," with reference to a previous thread on the effects of a break in training:

StanSeven

I can't cite any studies. I also know that myth about 10 days is half life of training isn't true. If you're fit and conditioned, you won't lose all that much. Just ease back in and listen to your body. Many of the tour finishers take a month or even two off this time of year before starting back.

ebrady

I usually strive to do at least a century a month, plus an occasional brevet. To properly balance family life and some vacationing I took six weeks off during June/July this year, 3 days after returning from vacation I rode a very hilly century without having been on the bike at all.
While there was a noticeable decrease in my performance, I still did better then me or my wife expected. I think the half life number is rider specific. I agree with Machka, do what you can and listen to your body.

sch

My view may have been a bit optimistic, 10-20% loss in 2months, and was based on
my own experience, as well as the apparent training breaks taken by pro athletes who
compete at the top 2% of physical capability. A bit of googling shows estimates of
10%/week which is obviously ridiculous for most of us, as 8 weeks off is not going to
reduce you to just barely being able walk the bike out of the garage as would be suggested
by an 80% decline, so I think it is reasonable to assume an initial decline of 10-30%
over a 2-4wk interval with slower declines thereafter. People vary and some will be
at one end of this range and some at the other. The drop off is clearly a curve of
varying steepness and degree depending on the person and the resumption of activity
of increasing intensity will rapidly restore the lost training adaptations, though not
quite as fast as they went away. My remark was anecdotal but that is par for the
course in these fora.

Jim from Boston

Thanks for your reply. My comment on the rate of decline was for the overall training effect, i.e. cardiac, respiratory and metabolic effects over a baseline as adaptations to increased effort. An 80% decline in training effect is not a decline of 80% in overall energy as described above. For example my usual resting heart rate is 48 when I ride my usual 70 miles per week. I trained for 10 weeks, bumping up the miles to 190 and my resting HR went to 42. About a week or two after the century, I was back up to 48. I still had training effect, but it had diminished, perhaps by about 50% as postulated.

When you suggest that there may be an inital decline of 10 to 30% (in training effect) over a 2-4wk interval with slower declines thereafter, you are describing an exponential decline (to a baseline, not to zero, by my definition) with a estimable half-life, perhaps greater than ten days. That's the value I would like to know and it probably does depend on the person. However it's of a passing interest to me and a literature search of controlled studies is too-time consuming, for me at least, so we continue to trade anecdotes.

Machka wrote on this thread, "Just be sure to listen to your body and to ease up or take breaks when you think you need them." One poor man's training technique I am familiar with is relative perceived exertion (RPE). RPE is measured on a scale of 6 to 19 (when multiplied by 10 approximates the heart rate), with each value described as the perceived level of exertion; 6 the resting level,...11 perceived as fairly light,...15 - hard,...19 - very, very hard and so forth. So a rider can feel he is exerting at a level of say 14 at any degree of training, but to maintain a defined energy output (miles, speed etc,) the perceived effort would be presumably be lower the more that individual is trained.

I partly agree that, "..the resumption of activity of increasing intensity will 'rapidly' restore the lost training adaptations, though not quite as fast as they went away" though I don't consider re-training to be "rapid." I thus try to avoid long layoffs, and this past Christmas week was a real dud for training ;-(

ericgu

It takes roughly as long to lose adaptations as it takes to get them. Adaptations that take a long time to get - such as aerobic base increases - also take a long time to lose.

Short term ones - like anaerobic threshold - are quicker to get, and quicker to go away.

So, you lose your short-term stuff pretty quickly, over a few weeks to a month, but the aerobic fitness lasts for a lot longer.

The Octopus 

This has been my experience, FWIW. My ability to race goes right out the window with the end of the racing season, but the ability to do long rides and rando events doesn't really change too much. But then it doesn't take all that long to get that top-end fitness back once you hit it good in the late winter.

I think some time away from the bike can be a good and healthy thing. Do something else for physical activity -- cross-training. Spend time with family. Re-energize. Hopefully you'll find that you're really motivated and charged up for whatever your upcoming events and goals are, and the time away will help you make some real leaps forward.

Of course, if the two months was spent eating like you normally do when in the full throes of cycling, then you could have some real work to do.

yeamac 

Thanks for all the replies. Cycling is pretty much my only exercise, so I haven't gotten much exercise of late, and have also been eating pretty unhealthy this holiday season and have gained about 7 pounds or so.

With your comments, I am more optimistic about starting back up on the bike again. I have taken the time off mainly because it gave me more time for work and family, both which I needed more of in the past couple of months.

I am hoping to go for a ride New Year's Day, if the weather cooperates. I'll probably start out with an easy 20 miler and won't be afraid to increase that in the weeks to come as my body feels like it.

levinskee

You will be fine! During the winter it's fairly inevitable for athletes to drop their rituals a bit, but that's okay. Just be really conscious about your body during the ride. I'm sure you know the basics...plenty of water and good carbs. Also, maybe just do some upper body exercises when the weather is bad. I'm sure your legs are fantastic, but just do some crunches, pullups, whatever.
Last winter when it was too cold for me to ride I just did a few indoor exercises and as soon as I hopped on my bicycle, I felt much better than the last time I had taken a break.

yeamac 

I ended up riding 24 miles today. Weather was decent here in Houston, I think it was near 60 degrees when I rode late morning. I could tell my speed was down a bit, and I ended up about 1 mph slower than my normal average on the route I took, but otherwise felt pretty good. I am sure I'll be churning out the long distances in no time. I may make 2009 my year to take up the century-a-month challenge, as I pretty much ended my riding in 2009 doing a couple centuries a month.

Added Jan 24:
I've been able to ride about 3x per week, from 20-40 miles. I went out and rode a century today and finished without a problem. Went pretty well other than the fact a cold front arrived about 5 hours earlier than expected, with winds about 15 mph at the start at 6:20 AM and then 20+ mph the rest of the day.

So thanks for the advice about prior conditioning. I didn't really loose that much.