Dieter

I just started cycling 4 weeks ago. First two weeks I totalled 100-150 miles, then I had a 220 mile week and this week I will end up doing around 100 miles (which will probably be the average week, 200+ weeks will be far between).

I try to do one longer ride and two days of climbing hills. The other days I ride shorter medium length at 70% of MHR. So far I have had one recovery day where I don't ride at all each week, usually after one of the hill climbing days.

I can feel the long ride the day after, but not nearly as much as I can feel it after a good climb. I wouldn't say that I am without power the day after, but I do feel it in my legs before starting. As I warm up it gets better, but I do think I would be able to ride farther and faster if I had two days of recovery instead of one.

So the question is... Does it sound like I am pushing myself to hard, or will the feeling of having used your legs always be there the day after, to a certain extent?

terrymorse 

Do legs always feel a little tired? Well, not always, but much of the time. For me, unless I've been tapering prior to an event, my legs will feel sluggish until they warm up. I'll just take it easy on the first climb, until my legs start feeling better.

The more tired the legs, the longer it takes before they start feeling good, and the quicker they fatigue. If they never get to the "feeling good" point, I know it's time to take an easy day.

Santaria

I ride daily. I don't think my legs ever recover to 100% simply because I also run 5 days a week ontop of my commuting and the normal rides to the store etc. I don't drive anymore so that my wife can have the van for her needs as she is now 7 months pregnant and I can actually get to her from work faster on my bike nowadays than I could in the car.

Taper is about the only thing I could say would mitigate a 100% recovery, since a taper is intended to allow you to get to 100% right before a race.

Guest

Not entirely. I mean, you want to recover as much as possible before your next ride, but I don't think we can bounce back that easily. The harder the ride, the more it's going to take for us to recover. If you're training for 5 straight days (for instance), maybe you can consider training every other day... or at least until your legs are not as sore anymore.

I find I can't do more than 3 consecutive days of cycling, so those are my longer days at high intensities. Then I take a day off, and I end up doing every other day, so I end up with 5 days of riding and 2 days off. Every 6 weeks or so, I take a full week off cycling entirely and allow my legs the time to completely recover 100%.

If you feel like your current training schedule does not allow you to recover so that you're able to improve on your riding, you'll most likely have to look at your training schedule and make changes so that you can see improvement. Overtraining is always a factor when you don't take the time out to rest sore legs and allow for healing time.

Koffee

Guest

As a P.S., do realize that since you've only been riding for 4 weeks, it's going to take some time to build up conditioning. Conditioning doesn't happen overnight, and if you try to push yourself towards a higher intensity when you're not ready for it, you will burn out. Don't push progress. It'll happen over time.

Koffee