I recently broke my thumb and will be off the bike outdoors for 6 weeks. I avg 750-900 TSS during a build week so I think its unrealistic that I’ll be able to maintain CTL but I’d like to reduce the loss as much as possible. I was thinking of doing medium build phase and probably incorporating some light rides outside… avg 400 TSS a week. I hoped to be able to build backup in October for 3 weeks by doing some cross races and indoor rides.
Once this is done I will start my official base in November.
Thoughts ? This is the first time I’ve had to deal with an injury while trying to minimise the loss of fitness. For what it’s worth CTL right now is 105.
If you can do ‘light’ rides outside why cannot you do ‘heavy’ rides?
If you can ride indoors then no reason why your CTL should drop. It is just a matter of putting more time in. However you save time with no waiting time, coffee stops etc.
My arms in a cast so heavy rides outside are out of the question.
I guess I’m basically wondering how much fitness I’ll lose if I attempt to maintain 400-500 TSS / Weekly. I can’t see myself doing 750 te 900 TSS on a trainer…
Pardon the bluntness here, but if your arm is in a cast, you don’t have any business riding outside. If it’s a cast like I’m envisioning, you can’t properly grip handlebars and it probably affects your ability to brake. Maybe I’m missing something.
You’ll lose some fitness at 400-500TSS, but if you’re just starting base in November, you’ll still come in plenty fit. In fact, your body might respond really well to backing off for a little while. Remember, the recovery from the injury is stressing your body already.
If you’re worried about a CTL number, it’ll fully recover in six weeks, so by mid-December you can be back up to 105 if you want… but as you know that’s not the true measure of fitness. I’d just back off, heal up, do some trainer work inside to maintain some fitness while recovering. And again, no way I’d ride outside if there’s any affect on your ability to grip/brake on your bike (I mean unless you’re making your living riding, that is… and even then…)
Yep, agreed riding outside is out of the question. I meant just light riding around but even if I did the amount of TSS would be negligible.
I guess I’ll stick with a medium build phase and also start some weight training. I’ll focus on getting fitness back starting in October by hopefully racing cross with some heavier training sessions.
Injury phase: A non-optional part of periodization that can get inserted at any time of the year.
I’m coming off a 4-broken-ribs-with-pneumothorax injury phase at the moment, planning to start a base phase next week. I hope I have learned enough to allow me to avoid these phases in the future.