Overtrain? Undertrain? Help please!

[coureur1]

Hi,

So my problem started to occur at the beginning of this week; felt lazy, had no power and my HR was very high(~ 15-20 beats above "normal"). I thought it was normal after sundays very hard 6h ride (totally empty after it!), and that it would fade away by few easy days.

Today my plan was to do some threshold efforts, but immediately at the beginning of the ride my HR was super high and I felt powerless. I tried to go a bit harder on a little climb for one minute; I was just gasping air and struggled to hold 340-350w! (my threshold is 350-360w. well should be!) I tried to do also an short sprint, and maxed out 1201w (2 weeks earlier maxed 1430w).
So I ended up doing one shitty hour. 187w avg./ 156bpm avg. (about 30bpm higer compared when i feel fit!)

So what could this possibly be? Becoming ill? I don't feel like it though. My appetite is normal and i sleep well. My motivation for training is quite low at the moment though...

On sunday I felt quite good. But last time i felt "super" was last weeks tuesday (4h hard ride).
You can see from the PM that I train and race quite a lot. Weekly volume is usually 18-25h.

[Tapeworm]

Do you have a coach?

What kind of plan are you using? Long terms goals, training cycles etc?

And yes, you sound overtrained. Assess sleep, nutrition and de-load (but not stop) training in the short term.

[Geoff]

+1 on classically over-trained! If you are 19 and being told to do work like that, you should consider switching coaches. That kind of training is what we used to do when we were your age. A lot has been learned about effective training since the 80's. We now know that big part of effective Periodization is the inclusion of an Adaptation Period between Macrocycles. It is at least as important as your Build Cycles.

[coureur1]

Well actually I don't have a coach. I just use my own feelings and knowledge(?), which is influenced by "lots of hours" philosophy and also by Allen and Coggan guidelines.

But yeah now I will back off the training a bit and hope it helps!

[Rick]

Could be overtraining or illness. Relax...take a few days off. No hurry.

[Yellow Shark]

Today my plan was to do some threshold efforts, but immediately at the beginning of the ride my HR was super high and I felt powerless. I tried to go a bit harder on a little climb for one minute; I was just gasping air and struggled to hold 340-350w! (my threshold is 350-360w. well should be!) I tried to do also an short sprint, and maxed out 1201w (2 weeks earlier maxed 1430w).
So I ended up doing one shitty hour. 187w avg./ 156bpm avg. (about 30bpm higer compared when i feel fit!)

Why didn't you stop the training? Your goals where too high and unreachable. So why train a 'shitty hour'? It's pointless, has no effect and brings only extra tiredness.

So what could this possibly be? Becoming ill? I don't feel like it though. My appetite is normal and i sleep well. My motivation for training is quite low at the moment though...

The last sentence is one of the signs of overtraining.

Advice
Take a full week (at least) of training (just do recovery or base), feel if you're getting fitter and after a week try a short but hard training (like 5 or 6 max intervals, with about 2 min recovery). Short training is about one hour. Check your data and then take your conclusions.

[amaferanga]

What did you do to get a daily stress of 800? Couldn't have been the 6 hour ride you mention unless you averaged well above FTP for the 6 hours.

What duration is the performance manager chart over? Are most of your rides steady endurance efforts?

[konky]

Your performance is most likely being effected by wavering motivation.

Restrict your hard rides to 4 or 4 1/2 hours.

Unless you are training for an endurance event 4 quality hours will almost always be better than 6 especially if motivation is wavering. Motivation is an issue for all riders and keeping motivation at optimun levels should be treated as central to your training, if not the most central part. I mean manage it, don't just be effected by it as it wavers.

6 hour hard rides are a recipe for disaster for most riders.

[coureur1]

Thanks for your advice.

So I took couple days off, did some easy longish rides and finally started to feel better again.
About a week ago I did 3h "fartlek" ride and ended up hitting one 10min climb a bit harder at the end as i felt quite good; 391w for that 10mins which wasn't even very close max effort. So I think my legs are coming back.

And yeah for that PM-chart, it is by TRIMP-score. Thats why you can see quite big numbers there...

[amaferanga]

Why are you using TRIMP score and not Bikescore / TSS?

[coureur1]

Because I have PT and race with different wheels.

[amaferanga]

Because I have PT and race with different wheels.

If you have a PowerTap then you should have a good idea of the sort of power you can put out and the Bikescore/TSS from a ride/race without the PT. Golden Cheetah Bikescore estimate tool is pretty good even. Never heard of someone with a power meter using an HR-based metric. Very odd indeed.

[tylerjandreau]

If you have a PowerTap then you should have a good idea of the sort of power you can put out and the Bikescore/TSS from a ride/race without the PT. Golden Cheetah Bikescore estimate tool is pretty good even. Never heard of someone with a power meter using an HR-based metric. Very odd indeed.

+1

Golden cheetah will estimate your TSS. Don't use TRIMP unless you absolutely have to.