off the bike.

Amprodude

How much fitness will you lose if you are off bike for 5 days leading up to a big event? I hope not alot?

ford2600

Amprodude wrote: »

How much fitness will you lose if you are off bike for 5 days leading up to a big event? I hope not alot?

5 days of bike, you won't know yourself. Rest is a big part of training.

Best of luck

Amprodude

ford2600 wrote: »

5 days of bike, you won't know yourself. Rest is a big part of training.

Best of luck

Knowing me it wont work but i live in hope.

kumate_champ07

none, depending on how hard youve been training you might 'gain' some!

pprendeville

The following assumes you have been doing some sort of training up to this point and haven't been a total couch potato .

You will lose a small bit of fitness but that will be compensated for by your lack of fatigue so in essence you will be fresher after the 5 days. The way I understand it is using a scale:

Fitness scale of 1-10 with 1 being terrible and 10 being fantastic
Fatigue scale of 1-10 with 1 being well rested and 10 being highly fatigued

So for example say your fitness on the first day of rest is 9 and your fatigue is 7 that leaves you with a margin of 2. If however after 5 days of rest your fitness drops to 8 but your fatigue drops to 4 you have a higher margin of fitness.

Excerpt From: Joe, Friel. “The Power Meter Handbook: A User’s Guide for Cyclists and Triathletes.” Ingram Distribution, 2012-08-31T22:00:00+00:00. iBooks.
This material may be protected by copyright.

“A highly fit but tired athlete doesn’t perform as well as slightly less fit but well-rested athlete. Fatigue is more powerful than fitness. It must be eliminated even if that means giving up a little fitness.”

If I were you I'd get a shotgun and wait for Mr.Fatigue to show his ugly mug and then bang, bang, bang - dead.

thebouldwhacker

+1
I did an endurance cycle 2 weeks ago, I was well prepared and trained hard. I stayed off the bike for 5 days pre event, stayed away from the gym and only did some slow swimming and a little physio. The event went very well, the following week saw me pb in 100 and 200km distances.
One danger with such a long rest is that you may feel lazy and slow getting back on the saddle so make sure your mental preparation continues. Know the course and understand what you want to produce, you'll explode like the Hulk. I should say I also ate and ate and ate. This was the week before easter so chocolate featured strongly, another point on the plus side of cycling.
I know others taper by reducing duration but keep intensity, whatever works for you.
Good luck!

Amprodude

Got two spins on this week. 50km and a light 35km. Wednesday and Thursday. Now im doing no more until race day. I have 3 races to do this weekend Saturday Sunday Monday and a TT. Hope legs hold up. It was a health issue that held me up and had to rest for few days because of it. All fine now i think and gp gave me go ahead.. I found my legs tired at the start of the spins and slightly less powerful even after 5 days. Going to eat all around me now for the races.

lennymc

I normally try and get out for an easy hour with a couple of short sprints and small efforts the day before the race to open up the legs. It will help the next day

http://cyclingtipsblog.com/2008/09/race-tune-up/

Kanturk 3 day? Good luck. It's a good race.

Zorba

This will tell ya everything you need to know

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/fitness/training/detraining-the-truth-about-losing-fitness-22330

Amprodude

lennymc wrote: »

I normally try and get out for an easy hour with a couple of short sprints and small efforts the day before the race to open up the legs. It will help the next day

http://cyclingtipsblog.com/2008/09/race-tune-up/

Kanturk 3 day? Good luck. It's a good race.

yeah im doing it. I know the circuits as i have done them before.