I have a 32 mile round trip commute, and I'm wiped out when I get home. Last night was my first "full" commute - I rode half of it twice last week. How soon does it take to get used to the commute? I've ridden 90 and 100 miles a week for the past couple of months, and that doesn't tire me the way commuting does.

I just had my first full commute as well. It seems to be about a 8-10 mile commute total so its not near what you ride. From what I've heard is that if you do anything straight for 21 days to a month you will be used to it by then. Keep on peddlin! I'm sure it'll be sooner than later if you stick with it.

How hard are you riding? Maybe if you slow down and take it a little easier, you'll feel a lot better.
You'll also be surprised at how little a time difference it will make. I have a 17 mile round trip commute and if I go all out, I can make it from home to the office in about 24 minutes. I will be useless for the rest of the day though. I can let up a little bit and get to the office in about 30 minutes and barely break a sweat and feel great for the rest of the day. So I chose to take it easier and it costs me all of 6 minutes.

How did you feel after you did half? If you felt all right, I would stick to those. In my book, 16 miles is a pretty long commute on bike. You can always try the long commute every now and then to see if you are up to it.

took me 2-3 weeks, starting from being pretty out of shape, but my commute was 1/2 yours.
keep at it, drink lots of water, eat right, get enough salt! You can do it.
you'll do something like 8000 miles/yr at that rate! wow.

It took me about 2 months till I wasn't even thinking about my commute. Give yourself a few months - eventually it will get better, but you have to give yourself time and rest days too. Sometimes, drive half way or so. Just work at it. You didn't get out of shape over night, you won't get in shape over night either - but you will get there faster than you would have believed possible.

I agree with MV, you might just be riding too hard. Commuting is a different sort of riding than riding in groups or out in the countryside. All the starting and stopping for traffic lights, etc., is more tiring because you're having to stop and accelerate to regain speed. Also, you might not be allowing enough time to warmup at the start of your rides. It's easy to start out too fast commuting because you're usually in a hurry to get to work or home. Personally, I've found that I need to take it easy the first 5 miles of any ride to warm up my muscles or I get sore later -- particularly in the morning when it is cooler outside. I generally treat my commutes like recovery rides, taking it slow and easy. If I feel like going faster, I wait until I warm up. My commute is about 10-12 miles each way. So that means the first half of the ride I am taking it easy, and sometimes I pick it up and go harder the last half.

Leave for work with enough time so that if you flat you will still be at work on time.
Wind direction will dramatically affect my commute times, so watch out for that.
If you are doing a partial commute, it may help. Drive in with the bike and cycle home, and do the opposite the following day, do it both ways on Friday. (No time worries if you are slower Friday night, and rest days coming up!) If you drive partway and cycle the rest, returning to your car each night, then you can be really creative: Strong east winds predicted for the evening? Park to the west side of work! Park so you have a more pleasant route! Feeling tired? Park closer. Building your endurance? Progressively park further away.
Don't let your commute get stale or burdensome.

I have a 30 mile round trip I started 5 weeks ago and I think it was this last week where I finally started to feel like the trip wasn't a big deal. I have started to take the ride home a little easier than the ride in so I don't blow my legs out. Not a lot easier, but maybe 10 -15 minutes more to get home. It seems to help recovery for the next day.

Good luck! In the 5 weeks I've been at it my leg muscles have hardened and I have dropped 10 pounds. My cardio is a lot better too. It's been a good experience.

My commute is 11 miles each way, moderately hilly, very few lights. It takes me 45 minutes in, 35 back (a little more uphill on the way in). I would try doing "every other day" commuting for two weeks or so. I found, even starting from a pretty non-in-shape base, that I made rapid improvement with consistent riding. 16 miles is long enough (and you're a bit older than me as well) that I think it will take longer to get used to it.

I think it took about 5-7 days of riding. I'm not sure if I'll ever be 100% used to having cars fly by me 3" away or getting squeezed by a bus, though.

Mine is 30 miles and it took a good month or so before I finally figured out how to do it. Like you, I do long rides and I figured that this 30 miles round trip shouldn't be a big deal. Hell, it takes me 30 miles to get warmed up on my long rides. My biggest problem was the speed. I was trying to push it too hard. I dialed it back a bit and averaged about 15 mph and I started feeling much better. It only added a good 5-10 minutes to the commute also.

interesting thread
over the past year, my commute has been from 5-8 miles (two different jobs)
It takes me about 2+ weeks to adjust to the commute if I stop riding
your adjust time of 5 weeks to a commute about 2+ times as long as me indicates some general physical adjustment time. I also dropped about 10-15 lbs over the spring.

Two weeks ago, I sold my car (gad-zooks!) we have one car in the household now, but my wife uses it for her job... so I'm commited to biking year round, or using the bus (which goes right by my house and work place). I'm looking forward in a way to the dark months of winter here in the midwest...

It took me about 3 months, and I don't have a long commute, the trick for me is to keep commuting. If I stop for a couple of days, it's hard to get back on the bike and go. Once I'm on it however, it feels wonderful and I wonder why I wasn't doing it every day. Other than that, just take it slow, enjoy it and watch out for the crazy drivers, my motto is "if you think they're going to be doing something stupid then they will and you won't be suprised".

When I was 20-30 miles a day it took about a month, but I started with the shorter and then kept expanding as I got stronger. Like a lot of others have said, try and take it as easy as possible, especially on the way home since you don't have to get there at a specific time. (If you do, because of kids or other commitments then maybe try and go in a little earlier?)

Took me about 3 weeks to get my legs back (12.5 miles each way, 5 years or so since I'd last ridden/lifted) then I traded in the crappy old MTB for a crappy new roadbike - been an actual pleasure since then, apart from the 1st few miles each morning. I'm not a morning person.

Never! I am an extremely antsy person and I need to have an outlet on a daily basis...so, if I don't arrive at work with my legs rubbery then I will go nuts sitting in a cube all day. As such, I push my commute as hard as I can, no matter what my fitness level. I am constantly trying to beat my own record home. I only have a 10 mile round trip commute, and I can do one way in just shy of 15 minutes right now, but there's no way to avoid the lights, which add probably 5 minutes total, at least, to the commute. At least three days a week I take the scenic route, which adds another 10 miles on my morning commute, and I just crank it as hard as I can. I like to feel dead

I don't know what I would do if I had a longer commute...perhaps I would continue to push it, but I think I'd lean towards taking it easier. Even my short commute took me a couple of weeks to get used to. At first I rode my geared bike and had to downshift and stand up on some hills. Now I can ride the whole thing at 42x14 or 46x17 depending on the bike and not even stand up once. Took me probably 2-3 weeks of solid commuting to get it back, and still at the end of the week I am dead ready for two days off!

Now I just have to sell my truck..anyone in Denver wanna buy a 2004 Dodge Ram?

Well, working 8 hours in between your morning ride and your evening ride might have something to do with that.

I commute 20 miles round trip and none of it is flat. Doing it 4 days in a row, which is the maximum number of days I've commuted consecutively, really takes a toll on me. By the 4th day I'm pretty slow, my rear end hurts a bit and the hills feel twice as long and twice as steep. I've since started riding 2 days, driving one and then riding 2 more days which is much easier on my body.

I would try carrying less stuff with you on your commute. I leave a couple pair of slacks at work along with a belt, a towel, toiletries, and a pair of dress shoes so all I'm packing is a shirt, underwear, socks, wallet, keys, and my work ID. I get a couple wears out of the slacks and then I'll take them and the towel home for washing on one of the days I drive in.

I commute on a lightweight road bike and it takes me about 40 minutes to ride to work, depending on lights, averaging about 14-15mph. It's funny, I looked at the trip computer on my wife's car a few months ago to see what her average speed is and noted that she averages about 20mph.

BTW-I just turned 40 in March. I dropped from 210lbs to about 185 simply by riding my bike over the past 2 years.

I started my 10 mile round trip per day commute this Spring and during the first 1 to 2 months I could realy feel my legs. The 1st few weeks were not full time since there was still come days of seriously nasty weather. At first it didn't look like I was making much progress. After a while I realized that I was also riding faster and faster each month. I ride on a hybrid bike as I ride in traffic and need to keep my head up and I also have the front shocks since the roads can be pretty bad around here, especially in Spring time. I also carry all my food and drink, fresh shirt, and some emergency repair gear with me. All this means that my setup is not ideal for speed. When I stated riding this spring I considered it a great day when I could average 12 MPH. Now that I've been doing this for about 5 months, my legs don't mind the ride at all and even when I push it hard I have no problems. I can now easily average 16 MPG, and have had days that I was over 18 MPH. Your commute is MUCH longer than mine and your body will definitely take longer to get used to it. Make sure you eat and drink properly before you leave, and keep yourself properly hydrated during and after the ride. I now also frequently get a chance to go to a extra office we just added and then I get an extra 5 mile strech in, and my ride home is lengthed to about 7 miles. I realy like those days now. Start with 2 days a week, then work up to three, etc. It takes some time, but a month from now I'll bet you'll feel it to be much easier.

Happy riding,
André

100 miles a week will keep you from turning into a slug. However, it's not that much so don't be surprised to not feel so good right now. As others have suggested, fatigue from the work day has something to do with how you feel, and you may be riding too hard. The nonvoluntary aspect of a commute and the fact that you're probably carrying junk makes it more tiring.

Stick with it. Your troubles will pass and this will eventually pay off big time. I'd say that if you wait a few more months, you'll gradually feel better and better. Eventually, you'll get totally addicted to it. You shouldn't be surprised if you're still improving in a year. It takes a long time to get in good condition.

I've got about 37 miles round trip, and I'd say after the 2nd or 3rd week it got considerably easier. Well, maybe not easy exactly, but just part of the day instead of wiping me out. Now I'm looking for a way to add about 7 miles each way so I can log 50 miles a day. Pretty fun to see how ones outlook changes inside just a few weeks.

Steve

I was just thinking earlier today that I've gotten used to my commute now. It's a great feeling. Now it's more about refinement. I work rotating shifts, and do partial commutes on the midnight and night shifts (about 3.5 miles of biking) and full commutes on the day shifts. (about 14 miles of biking). I am now in the 3rd month of this. Although I'm not much faster than I was before, the trip doesn't seem to take as long anyway.

This is my first post and I found this site after I started my commute. I live in portland and commute to downtown vancouver, wa... about 18-19 miles round trip. I work 4 nights a week and it took about two weeks to get fully used to the commute.

I think the best advice is to lighten up! Even when I had to carry a pair of dress shoes when I forgot to leave them at work. Also, I commute on a light road bike and it seems to go faster. plus, I started in last month (summer time) so I haven't had to deal with rain, cold, dark, and idiot drivers in the rain, cold and dark. Keep going!

Mine's a lot shorter than yours -- 7-8 miles each way, depending on the route I take -- but I have found that doing 7-8 miles in the morning and then again in the evening seems to take more out of me than doing 16 miles in one go. There's nothing at all scientific about that, but I doubt it's a matter of burning more calories, just that I'm not getting 24 hours of recovery time.

Thanks. I had to place the "call of shame" a third of the way back on the fourth commute. I was so tired I had to use the granny gear on the flats. Fortunately I had my car back for Friday.

I'm still going to bike commute, but for now it will be two-three days a week. I've done a lot of different exercise during my 19 month 142 pound weight loss, but the 34 miles a day of commuting is the hardest thing I've ever done. It's also the most fun.