Due to respiratory complications, I've spent the last few weeks not riding. And I've not been able to supplement my days with much other exercise. I'm on the down escalator to detraining.
The boffins say that detraining is:
the partial or complete loss of training-induced anatomical, physiological and performance adaptations, as a consequence of training reduction or cessation.
Training cessation implies a temporary discontinuation or complete abandonment of a systematic programme of physical conditioning.
We're talking discontinuation here, not reduced exercise or tapering. I hardly think of my daily ride as "training" and certainly not "a systematic programme", but I guess that's what it amounts to.
It's interesting to note that they don't talk about levels of "fitness". As they say over at Peak Performance,
'fitness' is a difficult term to define because we often find ourselves asking 'fit for what?'
This rings true for me: I've been unwell but I don't feel "unfit". But I have noted before that even a few days off the bike takes a bit of an edge off my usual capacity. So what can I expect now that it's been several weeks without a ride?
There a whole stack of things that happen when you detrain, a few of which I actually understand.
Cardiovascular
In the heart and lung department total blood volume drops within the first few days, which leads to reduced cardiac stroke volume (the amount of the red stuff squeezed out of the heart at each pump) and increased exercise heart rate.
Now cardiac output is calculated using the [simple formula][Peak e]:
cardiac output = heart rate × stroke volume
so you'd think the increased heart rate would balance the decreased stroke volume. Not so, apparently:
The increased exercise heart rate values resulting from cardiovascular detraining do not seem to be sufficient to counterbalance the reduction in stroke volume.
Added to that—even without the chest infection—my breathing is going l:
Maximal oxygen uptake (VO~2max~) has been shown to decline by anything from 4-20% with inactivity of two weeks or more
Joy.
I'll just skip the metabolism stuff because I don't pretend to
understand it (although [a rapid reduction in glucose uptake][Peak e]
doesn't sound like a good thing to me), and move
straight on to muscles.
Muscular
Here the news is mixed, but generally not good:
In previously active individuals, four weeks without training results in muscle capillarisation returning to pre-training baseline but it still remains above that found in sedentary individuals.
These guys report a number for the difference:
Interestingly, capillarisation in [athletes] appears to remain about 50% higher than in sedentary controls.
I don't think of myself as an "athlete", but I guess I do normally exercise fairly regularly, so I don't really qualify as "sedentary". Eh, I'll claim the higher capillary count.
While the distribution of fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscle fibres doesn't change much in a couple of weeks, the cross-sectional area—the bulk of the muscles—decreases. I reckon this was observable in my quadriceps in less than a week since I stopped riding.
Muscle strength and power also appears to drop off a bit within a few s, as does joint flexibility (although I don't think I had much of that to start with).
Other stuff
Another earth-shattering study found that:
The initiation of vigorous exercise and its cessation decrease and increase, respectively, body weight and intra-abdominal fat, and these changes are proportional to the change in exercise dose.
In other words, if you exercise you lose body fat and that if you stop exercising you put fat back on. Who'd have thunk it?
That said, I don't think I've put on any weight in the last few weeks of relative inactivity (don't really track it very closely), but then again I have been sick. Or it could just be the exchange of muscle bulk for blubber.
At the same time, my food intake has dropped quite a bit—I've had no need for second breakfasts or second lunches!
As for the psychological aspects, as I learned last year during the dark days of knee injury, withdrawal symptoms from lack of exercise are real:
Depressed mood and fatigue are commonly observed in individuals deprived of usual exercise activities, and the increase in fatigue may be partially mediated by reduced fitness levels. These findings may explain mood changes in response to short-term exercise withdrawal such as injuries and recovery from medical procedures that do not require full bedrest.
I suspect I'm not quite as grumpy as I was last year, possibly because there's an endpoint in sight and returning to cycling is highly unlikely to hinder my recovery. But I'm still not happy to be missing good Autumnal riding!
Implications
The cliché "use it or lose it" is broadly true, but if you do use it on a regular basis you don't lose all of it immediately when you're forced to stop using it for a little while. (And if you can follow that, you've done very well.)
As for returning to the bike, I'm clearly a fair way from my usual condition, so it would be unwise to leap straight back on and go hammer-and-tongs. Despite feeling better this week, I consciously resisted the temptation to rush back to the riding—painful though it is to go without a daily ride—because I'm still on the mend.
I hope to take myself out for a gentle trundle over the weekend and, if all goes well, hit the commute route again next week. The plans for doing a few brevets in May have long ago been abandoned, though hope springs eternal. Provided I'm riding well, some extra distance could be just the thing for regaining that lost condition. But maybe I'll give it a week or two before I push my luck.
But for now, I'll just be happy to ride again.
[Heart and lung image from Gray's Anatomy, via Wikipedia.]
Comments
I feel like I could paraphrase your entire post right now. Starting with: Due to orthopaedic complications, I've spent the last few weeks not riding. And I've not been able to supplement my days with much other exercise. I'm on the down escalator to detraining.
I've now had over 8 weeks off the bike after being hit by a car while riding to work. In daylight. In a bike lane. I suppose that just reinforces my long-standing bike lane agnosticism. Anyway, I believe I know how you feel. Six weeks into my recovery I started using my mag-trainer to try to retain, or recover, some of my fitness, retraining if you like. All of those things you've described above quickly came to the fore; I expected all of them but that doesn't seem to ease the suffering at all.
Like you, I will also be out for a bit of a trundle this weekend to start trying to rebuild my health and fitness. It's more likely to be a gentle 15-20km with my young son than my usual weekend 70-100km rides. And I expect to get home after a slow 20km feeling like I've done a hard 20 or more km.
Enjoy your recovery. Past experience suggests it will be quicker than you think, and the hardship of those first few rides, coupled with the memory of how (relatively) easy it was before will only serve to motivate you. "But for now, I'll just be happy to ride again." Too right!
Thanks Porl. Sounds like you're returning from a bit further back than me this time. After a three month lay-off last year (from early June to late August), I reckon I understand where you're coming from.
You're dead right though, once you're back on the bike you get most of the conditioning back surprisingly quickly.
Actually darling, it's tapering.
Drop that word into any cycling-themed conversation and you'll generally get a few nods of acknowledgment and empathy.
The Bloke does this every year, starting immediately after the Alpine Classic and then gently ramps up again in October.
Thanks for the link to that article abstract - I passed it on to a couple of people who suffer from depression from time to time and have not been able to exercise as much as they'd like recently, and they found it helpful.