Lost Fitness Fast!
Grumpy post alert.
I'm dismayed at how quickly I can lose fitness.
In Dec I was in good shape (for me) considering it was winter. I went to California, the weather was beautiful every day, I rode my roadbike all over the Berkeley Hills and then up Mt Diablo in low 39 X 21 which (again, for me) is a reasonably good level of fitness. I was doing pull-ups and feeling pretty trim. Thought I would enter the spring around 185 lb which would be my springboard to finally breaking <180 during summer.
Alas, in Feb we had a week of snow/ice that kept me off the bike, then I started five weeks of almost non-stop biz travel, living in hotels, eating whatever. Hardly rode my bike for over a month, and when I did my knee was twinging as I mentioned in an earlier post. Tried to keep my eating under control but still went up to 189 lb.
In mid March, travel ended. I resumed bike commuting and went on a fairly rigorous diet to shed some of this weight. Well, I'm finding myself depressingly weak on the bike. If normally I'd be in 53 x 17 at 20-23 mph, now I'm in 39 x 17 at 17-20 mph and it isn't effortless either. The bridge where I usually sprint hard, now I'm just grinding over it.
I think the weakness is a combination of being off the bike for awhile, plus significant calorie restriction (about 1600 cal/day). I also feel stiff, especially legs and ankles. Resting heartrate is higher than it was a few months ago. I started going to spin class again, where I'm seeing the same lack of fitness as when on the real bike. This week I actually had to climb off the spin bike before the class ended, which was embarrassing. Started also doing a class after the spin sessions, that is sort of Pilates with (light) weights. That is more challenging than I'd like to admit, especially with my legs coming right off the spin class.
I'm reasonably confident that I can get back in shape in a month, by end of April be where I was in Dec. But I sure lost condition fast. I guess that is a symptom of being 51 y/o?
Anyone have similar ups/downs? How quickly do you lose condition, how long does it take to get it back?
The good thing is that my knees are not giving me any problems. I don't know if it was the month of rest, or that I'm in the small chainring more.