Étape and coming back from injury

GinjaNinja

Hi guys,

I'm a sometimes poster long time lurker.

Some background. almost 2 years ago I was knock off my bike and suffered a nasty hip injury. Limited my abilty to exercise. 4 weeks ago I had an hip arthoscopy and oesteoplasty/labrum debridement.
I'm beginning to get back onto the bike on the turbo trainer and am wanting to set goals to help with training.

So my big Question is.

Would the Étape be out of my reach this year.
At my peak I was cycling avg 150Km a week in and out to work at a avg pace of 23 km/h. Route was Rush to Mount Street. (max was 270 km in 30km rides)

I've been looking at this link and was think that that could be possible.

Anyone have a similar injury and/or had a similar experience of going from novice to Étape in 6 months?

thanks in advance.

El Vino

I guess the key is what your medical professionals are saying, if you are 100% pain free and your body can take a heavy training load then it is certainly doable.
I wasnt a novice but went from a commuter to etap finisher (top 25%) in a similar time frame.

Ryder

doable....depending on time and medical advice. If it was me I would wait a year - the etape is a great event and with all the hassle and cost involved in getting there you may as well enjoy it.......which you probably wont do it youre starting now from a zero base. also factor in that you will likely need a gentle lead in time to heave exercise especially after recent surgery

codie

I played a lot of sport up to the age of 33 Rugby ,football,hurling.Now that the boots are well and truly hung up I am in pain almost everyday.I had a hip scope done 6 yrs ago and the advice the surgeon gave me was to take up cycling which I did.Had a knee arthoscopy done last year (same surgeon)and again he told me best thing for the knee is cycle,cycle ,cycle.No prob there I said .Had a great year on the bike but think I over done as I was preparing for the Rebel Tour and done some tough hills 1st week in Sept.Thought I was more than able for it having done the ROK and a good few 100's.Was putting up 250k a week.Now my knee is at me again and I am just doing the odd light spin with no hills.I am cursing myself but I probably would of suffered after the Rebel tour as I was tending to do the 160 ,healys pass x2
Take your time and don't rush yourself .If you set a goal like the etape you could find youself pushing too hard too soon .I would be with Ryder.Tip away for a while and then do a couple of charitys and Sean Kelly tour in the summer .If all is well do it 2015.

Eamonnator

In October 2010, I had a hip replacement, at age 59. I had been doing some cycling before the operation, but was quite overweight.i had stopped cycling seriously about 10 or 12 years before operation. Six weeks after the operation, I started back on the bike. I built up my mileage over the next few months.
In 2011, I did the W200, R.O.K ,Lap the Lough and several other sportives. In 2012 and 2013, I did about 15,000kms each year. My average speed this year has been 25.8 kph.
I hope, this is some encouragement to you.

GinjaNinja

Hi all,

Thanks all for the advice. I'll definitly be taking to the medical professional and getting their opinions.

Being back on the turbo is nice and have done about 25k in the last 3 days and its relatively pain free.

Sure I'll keep you posted on progress.

thanks again

pelevin

I'd say listen to your body most of all even more so than medical professionals. Would agree with Codie & Ryder's sentiments.

bambergbike

Could be perfectly doable, but is now a great time to be trying to assess that and make decisions? The trouble with a massive mega-event is that you need to commit to it at a very early stage. That's hard to do if you have any doubts at all, even if they're totally unfounded. The minute you start thinking about the Etape, the pressure is already on for you to make plans and fire a registration in. And then you're committed, and it gets harder to heed what your body or the medics are trying to tell you if you need to ease off.

In your position, I would pencil in a tough, challenging event abroad for 2014, but I would pick a really, really low-key one (like an obscure club sportive) so that you don't have to do anything about your decision for months and months. An obscure event might be worth going to and worth training for, but wouldn't come with too much emotional, organizational or financial baggage. And you could just sit on your hands for the time being.

There are tonnes and tonnes of these out there. Lots of them have a fair bit of total climbing, even though the individual climbs rarely spiral to the dizzy heights of the ones on the Etape. You could pick an event now, and train for it, but leave your vague plan festering as a mere pencil mark in your calendar until a few weeks before the event when you start to feel ready for it. With these small sportives, 3 weeks out is loads of time for you to commit (fire an entry in, sort out flights and accomodation.) So picking one or more candidates and then not doing anything about it for now might be a good compromise between a wait-and-see approach and goal-oriented, "hungry" training.

My own calendar for next year isn't even at the pencil stage yet, but this is a (random) example of the kind of event I'm talking about: a low-key event organized by a local club that would be challenging to complete, but not especially challenging to get organized for even if you left it until really late in the day. The medium mountains aren't big feckers, but I'd say they add up.

Route choices:

225 km, 3700 m ascent
170 km, 2540 m ascent
130 km, 2140 m ascent
85 km, 995 m ascent
41 km, 490 m ascent
20 km, flat

It's always on the first Sunday in September, and it starts in Bavaria, goes off into the Czech Republic and then comes back over the border into Bavaria. As I said, it's a totally random example (of hundreds!) and it's probably far from being the most spectacular choice. Could be mostly forestry and green fields with dandelions and cows.

GinjaNinja

So I had a meeting with my physio.

And along with most of the advice here, the word id it would be too much too soon. Whilst at a push I could probably do it, the cost could mean a early than expected hip replacement.

So her advice was to build up to 40 -60 minutes session over january on the turbo at hight cadence to stretch the muscles and lossen the area. Then build up the muscles with small simulated climbs.

Slow steady and always heed the pain of the joint rather than the muscles.

Sound advice. And she did mention to pick a smaller sportive and get confident on the road again, as that also took a hammering.

Now to training and build my body back. I'm sure i'll be on over the next few weeks asking about potential low-key events around april time frame and begin to get back to goof fitness and confidence.

Thanks all for helping me out.

ford2600

Aim for l'erocia in October? Do the distance your able for.
Wine and grub would be savage

GinjaNinja wrote: »

So I had a meeting with my physio.

And along with most of the advice here, the word id it would be too much too soon. Whilst at a push I could probably do it, the cost could mean a early than expected hip replacement.

So her advice was to build up to 40 -60 minutes session over january on the turbo at hight cadence to stretch the muscles and lossen the area. Then build up the muscles with small simulated climbs.

Slow steady and always heed the pain of the joint rather than the muscles.

Sound advice. And she did mention to pick a smaller sportive and get confident on the road again, as that also took a hammering.

Now to training and build my body back. I'm sure i'll be on over the next few weeks asking about potential low-key events around april time frame and begin to get back to goof fitness and confidence.

Thanks all for helping me out.