Went on holidays for 10 days completely off the bike, but when I came back onto a trainer to get back to previous form, few things surprised me… Perhaps you have some insight into why?
Muscular endurance went down, which I assume is normal, but my max sprint power went up!
Cadence went up…
HR / power ratio went up, which, again, I think is expected, but max HR went up and how I felt in that zone was also a lot better for some reason. Previously being 10 beats lower was already causing me getting somewhat faint. Wonder why I haven’t seen these extra 10 beats ever before?
As I don’t know what your training up to this point looks like, I couldn’t comment. What I’m more inclined to say is that after 10 days off the bike, you’re more likely to be completely rested and recovered.
Doubt you were truly overtraining if you feel better after only 10 days. You were just tired and had plenty of fatigue though and now you’re just fresh.
I’d say this is normal as well given your time off. When I’m training consistently in the heat I find that (both on the bike and off) I begin sweating more quickly and sweat a higher volume. My understanding is that this is a normal heat adaptation. When you take time off you lose this adaptation so you sweat less. I don’t think this is necessarily a good thing.
Thanks guys, so, perhaps, this boils down to importance if having rest now and then. I wasn’t training that much really, 8-10h / 400-600 TSS, about 300km per week, but since last season I took no break at all. During holidays, it was mostly hiking and driving. I will now try to see how long it takes to get back to usual performance…
I’ve often seen that max power can go up after a short (4/5 days) time off. I just put this down to the fact your body has absorbed the training from before and you’re not carrying any fatigue.