Originally Posted by
Wattsup
And from what I understand, your body gives you -numerous- warnings along the way that you'd have to entirely ignore in order to overtrain yourself. I think older cyclists are much more likely to injure themselves from not allowing enough recovery time, and injuring oneself is not the same as overtraining. I use TrainingPeaks and their PMC (Performance Management Chart) to judge my training status. The first step I notice when when my ATL (Acute Training Load) is getting a little high is that I'll wake up one morning and just not be very enthusiastic about riding that day.
I've learned to mostly ignore that when I'm trying to move that stubborn CTL. I watch for more direct physical symptoms. I even ignore muscle soreness for the most part. I find it way too easy to fool myself into not doing hard work. If my 3 minute morning standing HR come up 10 beats, or my training HR drops the same, I pay attention to that. Over time, I've found that most things like sore muscles and tendon twinges heal themselves if I work them, and don't if I don't. YMMV. The days when doctors prescribed rest for sore back syndrome are long past.