Increased mileage and recovery

[PotomacCyclist]

@dkel 86016 wrote:

Yep. That pretty much sums up this whole forum.

Some of us are more like chickens or fruits or cabbages.

[vvill]

A few months ago I was really interested in the fat-adapted athlete thing because I’ve often had issues fueling on longer rides. There’s a number of ultra-endurance guys who can make it a long way without eating, and survive on preloading (fat I assume) the night before (as far as I recall). There’s a book about it but I haven’t read it.

That said, I definitely do not have the discipline to follow anything too stringent: mostly I eat what I like, but I’m fortunate I don’t have a sweet tooth. I generally prefer savoury foods, and have (sometimes deleteriously) low blood pressure to begin with so salty stuff suits me just fine.

In terms of over a regular day (with bike commuting) I don’t always eat breakfast (or if I do, it’s not always a lot). But I usually snack around 10am regardless – I keep a supply of salted nuts in my cube at work for that (almonds, pistachios and cashews are my favourites, though I usually just go buy whatever’s on sale at CVS). I also eat large lunches, and they tend to be the biggest meal of my day. I buy lunch usually so I try to maximize what I get for my $ – typically something like a burrito, bibimbap, a big salad, pizza, etc. Most portion sizes around these parts are more than decent though really. It actually got to the point where I would be un-hungry enough at dinner time that my wife got annoyed (understandably, since she usually makes dinners). The only issue is I tend to crash shortly after lunch, but I’m an advocate of power naps too, so it’s okay…

On weekends I like big breakfastses since they’re later in the day and I can take the time to make eggs, etc.

I do drink a lot of water, and generally don’t imbibe anything sugary (the exception being high pulp OJ at some breakfastses, and recovery chocolate milk). I take coffee/tea black, and soda is a rare treat (I often add lots of ice for it to taste okay).

[vern]

The primary way I recover between legs of my commute is to do what I just did…I just finished sitting in the spa pool at the Sport & Health Club in my building. My legs felt sore and tired prior to the soak, but just 5 minutes in the pool revived them. I do that everyday at midday and it never fails to work.

[Emm]

Protein (generally greek yogurt) and a banana are my go-tos when I am sore and tired. About a month ago after an especially mean commute into work (20+ mph winds against me the entire hilly 10 mile ride, while hauling 30 lbs on my panniers on what may be the LEAST aerodynamic bike ever), my legs cramped…for 4 days. I took the next day off biking, but even so, I was in pain for a week. My sports-trainer friend told me I needed to eat protein a banana within 30 minutes of every shorter ride, and also do the same during any longer rides. I was also told to avoid carbs for 60-90 min after a ride.

2 weeks ago the same mean commute happened. And a greek yogurt and a banana later I was angry at the world and a little tired…but no cramping and not nearly as tired as I’d been. I’m sure some of it is also that I’m building muscle and getting stronger, but still. The food made an immediate impact on my morning and evening soreness.

I also found just upping my veggie servings and cutting carbs in my diet overall (e.g. less rice, more green beans at dinner) gives me more energy, and I sleep better. Switching to homemade bread from store bought bread also caused a pretty quick weight loss for me, so I’d recommend that to anyone who loves bread, but also wants to lose weight and eat healthier. Bread is way easier to make than most people assume.

(note: this is all being written by a woman eating McDonald’s chicken nuggets and fries for lunch because the Nats scored 6 runs…and I’m cheap and wanted my free chicken nuggets)

[consularrider]

@Emm 86112 wrote:

(note: this is all being written by a woman eating McDonald’s chicken nuggets and fries for lunch because the Nats scored 6 runs…and I’m cheap and wanted my free chicken nuggets)

But they tore down the Rosslyn McDonalds.

[sethpo]

Wow, some of you are WAY better at the “eating healthy” thing than me! Congrats to you (no snark).

I think what I’m going to try is some nuts and peanut butter at my desk for a 4-5pm snack before riding home. I’m sure I’d benefit from a more comprehensive overall of my fuel intake but I really don’t like to think that much about it during the work day.

Thanks, all. I knew this group would have lots of good input on my inputs.

[rcannon100]

@PotomacCyclist 86020 wrote:

Some of us are more like chickens or fruits or cabbages.

Shrek: Cyclists are like onions.

Donkey: They have layers?

Shrek: Yes… No!

Donkey: Oh, they make you cry?

Shrek: No!

Donkey: Oh, you leave ’em out in the sun, they get all brown, start sproutin’ little white hairs…

Shrek: [peels an onion] NO! Cyclists stink. Ogres stink; Cyclists stink. You get it? We both stink.

[n18]

I had very good results from taking Natural Eggshell Membrane(NEM) supplements. It helps rebuild the joints and the connective tissue surrounding them; slowly. Other supplements are generally pain killers, they bring temporary pain relieve, which makes you abuse your joints even more, and unlike NEM, they have side effects.

I have been biking for about a year, and before that, I was walking 5 to 10 Miles per day. Prior to biking, when walking, I would wait for right turn traffic to go away before walking because my joints and feet hurt a bit when I run to avoid right turn traffic. After taking the supplement for 5 days, I felt noticeable improvement as I could run as usual like younger people(I am 42 now). It was noticeable improvement, and not just something in my head. Reviews in Amazon show several people who threw their cane away after taking this supplement. You can find it at Vitamin Shoppe for about $22 to $25.

After biking however, I don’t notice any changes, because I use my bike a lot(10 to 30 Miles per day), so any joint rebuilding is offset by the heavy biking. So if I start taking this now, I would say it doesn’t work, but I know it works because I have taken it prior to my biking days. If you only bike or jug during the weekend, and you started taking this supplement on a Monday, then by Friday or Saturday you should feel that you could do more, but if you exercise to exhaustion, then maybe the only way to tell the difference is if your Strava or MapMyRide data shows more mileage.

Clinical study results:

• Flexibility: 27.8% increase after 7 days, 43.7% increase after 30 days
• General pain: 72.5% reduction after 30 days
• Range of motion-associated pain: 75.9% reduction after 30 days

Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2697588/

[PotomacCyclist]

I had a lot of injuries in my first year of running as an adult (back in 2008-2009). I ramped up the miles far too quickly. I also had some weakness and imbalances in the hips and quads. The neutral cushioned shoes may have contributed. (Thick-soled running shoes still feel like unstable stilts to me. I don’t run completely minimalist, but close.)

When I had a really bad case of runner’s knee (kneecap misalignment during the running motion), I tried chondroitin/glucosamine supplements. I didn’t find that they did anything at all. My problem was that the hip/quad imbalance or weakness was letting my kneecap drift to the side when I bent my knee. Just enough so that it was scraping against the cartilage of the groove, which the kneecap travels through. Normally the kneecap slides between the two protuberances on the top of the tibia. In my case, it was grinding into the side and irritating the cartilage. (I had never had such knee problems before in my life.) At first, I just started hearing a clicking noise every time I walked, but not when I ran. As the weeks went by, it started hurting. After a month, it became excruciatingly painful, to the point that I had to stop running for a couple months. I couldn’t even bend the knee when I walked at that time.

Fortunately, the solution was very simple. If I had done it at the beginning, and also limited how many miles or how much time I ran, I wouldn’t have had any of those knee issues. It was functional strength training — compound bodyweight and free weight exercises, core focus, single-leg exercises. This focuses on coordinated movement, core stability and muscle balance. After just a couple sessions, my knee finally stopped clicking. That meant that the kneecap misalignment was resolved. The only issue was the damage I had already done to the cartilage. But no worries. I just had to take some time off and the cartilage healed on its own (along with good nutrition and plenty of sleep). The knee continued to hurt for a couple months. I might have been irritating it by swimming during that time.

I had other knee, hip and lower back issues after I started up again. Then I started over. Two weeks off. Functional strength work. Start over with low-intensity training, and only ramping up very gradually. No more knee problems. The next year, I had severe shin splints (exercise-induced compartment syndrome, which is not the same as traumatic compartment syndrome). Lower-leg isolation strength exercises (bent-knee calf raises, straight-leg calf raises, toe/shin raises) resolved the problem, for good.

I don’t do strength training year-round, but I do make sure to include a good program of ST in the early winter. Even just a couple months and then maintenance strength work for much of the rest of the year has been more than enough to fix all of my muscle imbalance and weakness problems (primarily from running, but I think it helps with cycling too). I haven’t had any knee, hip or lower back overuse injuries in 5 years now, whereas I was almost constantly injured during my first 12-15 months of running.

I would always rely on good nutrition, enough sleep, functional strength training and smart training principles before relying on any supplements. If something hurts, you have to treat the cause, not put a bandage on the symptoms. Smart training is important. Beginners should start off with low intensity and shorter workouts. Build up the weekly hours very gradually, and not every week. Let your body get used to the new workload, whether that’s 3 hrs. a week or 5 hrs. a week or whatever. Watch out for intensity as a beginner or if you’ve never done much intensity before (steep hills, fast rides, sprints). If you want to add those elements to cycling, add it in measured amounts. If you’ve never done a tempo workout, start off with short intervals of a couple minutes with a few minutes recovery at moderate effort. Only do a few intervals the first time out and see how it affects your legs and hips. Bump it up slightly after a few weeks and see how that goes. Take some easier weeks where you don’t add too much intensity, to give your body some active rest. (You can still ride, but you wouldn’t include intensity in the active rest weeks.)

The more ambitious you try to be with riding and training, the more seriously you have to work on nutrition, recovery and smart training principles. If you’re only riding for 20 minutes at an easy pace, on a flat route without too much wind, a couple times a week, there is much less to consider. But once you start ramping things up and introducing more hours on the bike and more intensity (speed, hills), then you have to take care of the other elements. If not, then injuries, illness and burnout become much more likely.

Note: You can get away with pushing it a little more with cycling, than with running. That’s because cycling is lower-impact than running is. But beginners should still be mindful of not doing too much, too soon. For example, if you have a bad bike fit, it might not affect you when you’re only riding 3 x 30 minutes a week. But the bad bike fit will become more noticeable if you are riding 5 hrs. or 10 hrs. a week. If you ramp up slowly, you can notice these issues before they cause significant problems. Then you can fix it before it causes serious overuse problems.

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