Would doing a recovery ride on the same day help you recover faster for the next day?

[Shrike]

Say you had a hard ride in the early morning, but had another hard ride the next day. Would doing a short 45min recovery ride in the evening help you recover faster for the next day? Or would the fatigue generated not outweigh the benefits?


I spotted this on a blog that was promoting a second ride in a day when I was looking this up. See the last line:

"Turns out, the real benefit in “recovery” workouts isn’t the lactate removal (which actually happens pretty rapidly whether your rest is active or not), not the increased blood flow and delivery of nutrients to the muscles, nor the expedited replenishment of muscle glycogen. So what is it?

Without delving too deeply into an explanation of IL-6 and all its characteristics, both in terms of in-exercise fatigue as well as post-exercise adaptations, suffice it to say that a proper level of fatigued exercise can have a tremendous benefit on the way your body responds to the added stress.

In a nutshell, you’re not furthering or enhancing your body’s recovery but rather you’re furthering the training stress in a potentially productive manner."
http://blog.trainerroad.com/training-twice-day/

SO he's saying recovery rides aren't really recovery rides. They make you more fatigued but it's still a good thing in some other way. Which I'm thinking would be good in the long term, but bad in the short term, i.e. crap for being ready for a ride the next day?

[Hillsaretheenemy]

No science, but I'd be doing a longer cool down after the first ride and forgetting a second ride. Recovery rides are unproven. They may work for some but in my experience it just adds stress and delays actual recovery. A longer cool down/spin down after a hard ride can help settle muscles and flush the bad stuff setting you up for a quicker recovery. Stopping immediately after a hard effort definitely leads to situation that takes longer to recover from. Just my experience.

[Hillsaretheenemy]

No science, but I'd be doing a longer cool down after the first ride and forgetting a second ride. Recovery rides are unproven. They may work for some but in my experience it just adds stress and delays actual recovery. A longer cool down/spin down after a hard ride can help settle muscles and flush the bad stuff setting you up for a quicker recovery. Stopping immediately after a hard effort definitely leads to situation that takes longer to recover from. Just my experience.

[Shrike]

Didn't know that recovery rides were unproven/unscientific, but I've had a poke around since your post and it seems you're right - it's not proven! But it's in training plans everywhere, so I thought this was a done deal.

On a related note.

I have a problem that if I take a day off - say Monday - after a hard weekend. By the time I ride again, say Wednesday late afternoon/evening then my legs feel tight and inactive. As if they're shut down. The next day though they're good, but I'm fatigued and can't hold power for long. SO that's two days without being in a good state, after around 48 hours recovery. One day everything's tight and shut down, then next day fatigued..

So I'm thinking maybe recovery rides can keep the legs active or stop them tightening up..

[antonioiglesius]

For me, two days off the bike is max before my performance starts to decline. Completely off-the-bike recovery seems to work better for me. The problem with recovery rides is that we're supposed to go slow, but I see people going hard/long distance and call that 'recovery'. I'm guessing that looks cooler on social media. Also +1 for the unproven part, I tend to stick to medical professional's advice instead of bike fitters/coaches/non-medical staff who are proponents of pseudo-science.

[jpanspac]

IMO the blog article doesn't make a lot of sense. He states that there is no evidence that recovery rides/runs help, but then says the real benefit is not in clearing lactate, etc. Well, if there's been no research how does he know what the real benefits are or are not?

[bm0p700f]

I think it depends what your training for again. For me there are just rides. Some are more intence than others. Thd intence ond or the long one fatigue me. The low intensity rides dont seem to stress me much but certainly slow down recovery however i do think the help my body deal with stress and fatigue.

I dont pretend to understand why but low intensity rides help but leave them till the next day or it iz just a warm down which is essentially a rixe extension.

[AJS914]

That blog seems like a very wordy way of recommending increased volume. I don't think there is anything magical about it being two rides instead of one. He also is talking about recovery riding but then concludes with the fact that he over trained. It's hard to figure out the take-away from the blog. Maybe summarized as 'add volume' with extra truly easy riding but don't overdo it and get in an over trained state.

[ms6073]

f there's been no research how does he know what the real benefits are or are not?

Pretty sure there has been loads of research on post ride/race recovery processes, but the problem is that the results often time tend to not be very conclusive due to variability of the study groups. While not remotely an apples-to-apples comparison, there must certainly be some physiological benefits to post race cool down, otherwise why would we see the pro's on trainers post race?

[AJS914]

I think it's one of the more questionable of the 'marginal gains'. It's probably good marketing when the whole Sky team is out in front of the team bus cooling down.

I just googled for any research or findings and there doesn't seem to be science showing any clear benefit. One article mentioned the psychological benefit of doing some slower movement after a maximal effort in order to just feel normal and comfortable. I can totally see that. I wouldn't end any training ride with my heart rate at 100% when I arrive back at my house. It seems natural to do some easy riding for the last mile or two.