drmweaver2

Background: In May of this year, I rode 30 straight metric centuries on my Df. In July, I was forced off the DF (basically forever I think) by an accident. In August, I started riding a recumbent trike and have since amassed just over 750 miles on it. I'm no speed demon on it but have begun to "settle in" and feel that my pedaling technique has made significant adjustments to the new "riding platform" (including switching to clipless from toe clips).

The situation: Having the "benefit" of hindsight, I'm not sure that I really got any serious fitness benefit from the 30 metrics in 30 days (and no, my accident was not bicycle-caused or related).

The question: Does anyone see any benefit of doing the same thing on the trike starting tomorrow/the next day? There are 2 essentially flat routes nearby with little traffic and few "forced stops" (signs, intersections, etc.) and a 3rd that begins about 10 miles away (so an 80 miler those days) to provide some variety.

Or is this simply a pointlessly foolish idea tending towards overkill especially considering the lack of days off? In May I didn't yearn for days off until the last 3 or so and my knees held up pretty well. I was 90% ready to go each day of the "event".

To be honest, I'm not sure of why doing this "again" appeals to me, but it does somehow.

RichardGlover

That's all that really matters.

unterhausen

sounds fun. If you want to do it to improve your fitness, it would probably be better to mix in shorter, faster rides and some days off. But if you are getting enough rest, 60 miles a day really isn't that much.

Hydrated

Bwahahahaha... You do realize how crazy that sounds to a non-cyclist, right? My coworkers think that I'm some sort of superhuman because I commute 10 miles each way to work. I don't tell them that I wish I lived a little further away from work...

unterhausen

I figure 200k every day is pretty much my limit

Rowan

The critical factor seems to be rest, or lack of it. You might be fine doing the 30 metrics in a month, but at some point you are going to "overtrain". You didn't indicate what you did in June and July leading up to the accident (what happened, by the way?).

Do you have a heart rate monitor to keep a check on whether your beats are elevated when you wake up in the morning? Investing the time to check that will help you understand if you are overtrained because elevated resting HR is a clear manifestation of that.

And overtraining can lead to other physical issues. The fact that you were feeling less keen on the final three May rides indicates to me that overtraining was starting to surface.

The other significant advantage is that you can stop riding the "challenge" whenever you want, simply because it is a personal one and only bragging rights are the prize.

drmweaver2

My last 3 days of riding in May were more "mentally taxing" than physical though I did have the beginnings of slight knee pain that resolved itself within a day of "completing" the challenge. The accident had nothing to do with the bike. I'd like to leave it at that.

June had under 400 miles riding total. Just pootled around as the Brits say. The accident was over the 4th of July weekend, so no riding at all during July after that other than 2__5-milers that convinced me DF's were never going to agree with my back again.

Just recently bought a HRM. Still figuring out how to use it "properly" for training. The numbers don't mean much to me yet as I don't have enough data/background to make sense of the numbers. Ex., I have no clue what my "max" is. My early morning HR over the last 30 days has been in the low 60s even after metric centuries the day before (4 on the trike so far).

StephenH

Personally, if all my time was free, and I wanted to do something just for bragging rights, I'd rather do a 200k every other day. If I was like retired or something, I might do a 100k every day, but it'd be real leisurely, not as a workout.

drmweaver2

That's actually one of the self-challenge possibilities that had occured to me which make this a "question(able)" thing. What (exactly) appeals to me, is enough of a challenge to BE a challenge, and yet is accomplishable given my current level of fitness, motivation and long(er)-term goals - oh, and a constantly decreasing amount of daylight?

I've already done the latter (100k every day for 30 days but on a DF), never the former (200k distance) on a trike.

I'm slower on the trike by a significant amount. I have yet to ride further than 80 miles at once on the trike, at ~11-13 mph, and it took all afternoon/evening for my knees to recover. So, a 200k distance would be an all-day thing for me on the trike with a currently unknown amount of recovery time.

I'll decide later today, I guess, as my favorite college team is playing a daytime game and I want to watch.

Barrettscv 

This.

drmweaver2

Okay.. I decided.. (had to do something during halftime).

I'm going to alternate rides of 30 milers with rides of 100k/62 miles, 160k/100 miles and/or 200k/125 miles for 30 days. The shorter rides will be recovery/stay loose rides while the longer rides are (obviously) the more challenging ones for me on the trike. I don't expect the shorter rides to be anything but get-out-and-stay-loose rides but could be challenges if the weather doesn't cooperate. The longer rides combined with decreasing daylight hours and not taking any days off during the next 30 days will create their own challenge(s) for me as a fairly new triker.

I won't waste BF forum space documenting this self-challenge here (much) because I decided to try that blogging thing. If you're interested, here's the blog link... https://cruisingtiger.wordpress.com/

Thanks to those who commented.

10 Wheels

I want to ride a 100 miles every other day next year.

Be safe, ride for fun and fittness.

StephenH

You mention your knees recovering- if that was an issue, I might re-work the timing as needed. On the 200k every other day, that's assuming you can finish the 200k and still be feeling good. The rest day in between is to give your muscles a rest, but if you're having joint problems or something like that, you might have to rework the schedule accordingly.

Richard Cranium

An important part of any task is whether the person doing it has reasoning for its value.

So whatever convoluted mix of riding you perform - must have some meaning to you or it will never be much chance of advancing your fitness.

As far as whether some schedule advances your cycling fitness - the stock answers is always - "total mileage alone never represents training volume or training efficiency."

There's more to cycling than "just riding."

Rowan

That's the bit open to individual interpretation. For millions cycling means a form of transportation. And for others it's a simple recreational pursuit that brings them pleasure. There is a reason but for most, their motives meld into "just riding".

By the way, RC, how are the ribs and other injuries coming along?

drmweaver2

Um, yeah. Okay.

Seriously though. I have never been one of those people who are evangelistic about riding or triking. I don't ride just to ride. And I hate "training" per se. So I have to sort of con myself into doing things sometimes. This is one of those things.

Just riding though, would accomplish a few things - even at a slow pace, endurance increases and thus/because the cardiovascular system improves in comparison to being sedentary. Unless there's some sort of overuse injury, there must be some muscular improvement. And it occupies time without spending money.

Meaning? Riding, by itself, has no meaning to me. Fitness might - but I'm not shooting for AHNULDnom. A bit of weight loss would be a plus but it's not a goal in or of itself for me.

"It's a challenge." Probably the most valuable thing to me as I haven't had any truly interesting but non-life-threatening challenges since surviving Hurricane Katrina - and before that, retiring from the military a bit over 15 years ago.

unterhausen

the one concern your posts raise is that your knees need to "recover." Not sure what that entails, but I don't think knees recover all that well. I would try to figure out what is going on with the knees and work on that. In my case, swimming helps with the muscular imbalance that causes me to have knee pain. That certainly isn't a cure-all, but it helped me a lot

drmweaver2

About 20 years ago I had knee surgery on both knees - suspected ACL/MCL and meniscus damage on both knees beforehand but the surgeon said he found nothing during either surgery. Nevertheless, the pain I was experiencing at the time has never completely gone away -- they still cause me pain just from walking at times. On the bike or trike, I can get residual "top of the knee" pain after particularly long or strenuous rides, but usually that just goes away within anywhere from a few hours to a day later.

FWIW, in May I was not using clipless pedals on the DF. Since switching to the trike I HAVE also switched to clipless and it's made some difference in comfort and ability to spin longer & faster with less (to no) pain depending on the specifics of an individual ride. So, I'm pretty aware of both the current condition and potential damage of my knees. Thanks for the concern though.

thebulls

"Does anyone see any benefit... "

Benefit is in the eye of the beholder and since the presumed benefit is to you, only you can decide. If you ask more specifically "Does anyone see any _training_ benefit ... " then the answer is unambiguously "no". You'd be much better off having "rest days" (which doesn't mean no riding, but does mean that whatever riding you do is as close to a resting heartbeat as you can get) in the schedule so that your muscles have time to rebuild and adapt to the training load. And you'd also be better off mixing up the type of riding that you are doing so that some days you are training intensely but for shorter time/distance and other days at moderate intensity but longer time/distance.

unterhausen

not having rest days doesn't really mean that there is no training benefit though, it just isn't as much as it would have been with rest days

Similarly, I've seen people say there is no training benefit from riding a 1200k, but PBP definitely made me stronger

Homeyba

That's the problem with definitive statements. I've gotten stronger after 1200ks too. I think it depends on how you ride them. If you ride it like a race I think you won't be doing yourself any good. If you ride it and allow yourself time to recover and rest (during the ride) then I think you can get stronger after a 1200k. Especially if you come into it at less than your optimal conditioning.
Riding every day isn't necessarily a bad thing. Most professional riders ride nearly every day. But, they don't ride hard every day! To be able to do that you will have to gauge your effort each day. You need to have a day or a couple where you do your miles but you do them at an easy pace, basically a rest days on the bike. Watch your body, see what it's doing. It'll tell you if you're over doing it!

chasm54

Long, steady distance rides are great fitness-builders. Steady, not slow. I was able to retire at the start of this year and took the opportunity to do a two-month tour in May and June. I rode a heavily-loaded tourer an average of 100k per day, six days a week. Obviously I worked hard on the hills, but apart from that I made no effort to hurry, and I was generally chugging along with an average HR of 110-120.

When I came home I did my usual TT course. I was 5% faster despite not having done any top-end, intensive work. Don't let anyone tell you that extensive, moderate training doesn't build speed. If you have the time to do it, it is great training.

thebulls

Point taken. My post would more-accurately say "...unambiguously 'not as much as training benefit as possible.'"

FWIW, I was definitely stronger after PBP, after a few rest days. But if I had tried to ride a 30-minute time trial the day after PBP I definitely would have been slower than if I had ridden the same time trial the day before PBP.

drmweaver2

Well stuff happens and it's not always planned.
My self-challenge will be taking a short hiatus - hopefully short, that is.

My 80-year-old father, with whom I live, surprised me by up and buying a nearly new TerraTrike Rover yesterday. We picked it up last night and went riding tis morning. This means that, for the next two weeks or so, I'm going to go riding with him. It's totally unreasonable for him to leave at oh-dark-thrity as I tend to do. It's a bit impractical to start later, after riding with him, and then do my own ride(s). He's certainly not going to try the distances I am or ride at anywhere near the speed I am trying to ride. And there is no back-up/emergency driver if he rides alone and has an emergency/breakdown. So, all of that is definitely going to affect my own riding for at least a short time while we sort out the trike (maintenance and fit-wise), his early riding pains, and get the usual assortment of accesories for him to ride alone. Add in his normal cantankerous, Type A personality when facing ANY pain (or less than "perfect" whatever) and the next few days may be more challenging for me than the riding would be.

So...things are on hold. Sigh.
And it's good riding weather now too......

CHAS

I suppose you have tried adjusting your saddle to aleviate the knee pain.
If you have time to ride a metric everyday, do it. Why not?
Take a day off when you want a break. Put you Dad's place on your route and meet him part way through the ride.
Do it if only to make me jealous.