When are you taking the magnesium? It can be sedating I’ve been told. 
I’ve been using it in the morning. So far so good. Only 5 days into dosing. My kids ask for it at night because they think it helps them calm down for bedtime. I haven’t experienced any sleepiness.
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Switch to bedtime and see what happens…
I was doing 2 500’s at night and was told, after doing in for nearly a year, that the reason I was tired was likely because I was taking so much, and at night - I was having a hangover from it. Now down to 600 and no hangover. (Magnesium also helps with 
ing)
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Did anybody try an amino acids test, like nutreval? I got some big deficiencies i’m still working on, and a blocked Krebs cycle i have to deal with. I’m curious to see if anybody else tried that. I will probably do a full post once everything is sorted out.
It’s all good and I appreciate it. The reason why I had questioned your original comment about it being within normal was that my GP doc flagged it and mentioned that it was abnormally high—even though I thoroughly explained my background as an endurance athlete.
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Got back on the bike today. Commuted. 2x rides at 0.54 and 0.56 IF. 16 & 19 TSS.
Still feeling like my legs are toast. It’s wild how such low wattage feels like I’m riding at high tempo or sweet spot.
I feel as though I have found myself in a monthlong struggle with non-functional overreach or something like that. I really hope I can bounce back, but it is demoralizing when 150w feels like effort.
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Did they first catch it through hematocrit-hemoglobin being off, or were those normal, and only appeared on a separate low ferritin test?
Hey, you may just be feeling the after effects of a virus + the mental stress of being ill.
Of course, there may be something worse going on so reschedule another doctors visit and continue to investigate.
However, this is me, I get a bit sick, then (having experienced burn out too many times both in training and life in general) my mind takes over and tells me thats it, I’m burnt out. Or I am under a lot of life stress and my mind kicks in and tells me I’m sick. It isn’t always possible to tell them apart.
I was sick about 6 weeks ago, probably Covid. The whole household was properly ill but I didnt really get the worst of it. Got back to training relatively quickly as was in my taper and felt good for a couple of days, but then the fatigue hit. It could have been Covid, it could have been psychological, it could have been both. I was well enough to work, well enough to do home life, but only by a margin and waa dragging myself through training most days.
Ultimately it meant I cut my A event short, and even with that had a raging resting heart rate 20 beats higher than normal that afternoon.
I did feel under prepared for the A event as I had tried to listen to the advice that you dont need to do big miles in training for big events but, for me, a few more huge days out on the bike would have given me confidence that I can still do the longer stuff. I just never had that confidence I would complete it now as my life is so different to when I was doing the big events before. I think that had a huge impact psychologically which translated as physical stress.
I’m now on a third week of no plan, although I have started to introduce structure again and I feel AMAZING right now, like the best I have for years, what a crazy turnaround. In terms of the little structure I have done…its only been what makes me feel good - sprint work and anaerobic sessions. The threshold and sweetspot work is what destroys me, plus I get a fair amount of time in those zones when riding with friends (because they are fast and our hills are cruel). I am enjoying the strength work so much too right now. So much so I am not going to follow a plan again for a while, at least not until my FTP really starts to plummet. I am embracing feeling good over being faster.
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Well looking back my ferritin had been low for quite a while (in the 30s and dropping). My Primary Physician didn’t seem to notice it or comment on it, so I didn’t realize it. It wasn’t actually until I switched to a new doctor and happened to watch Dylan Johnson’s video on low Iron where the lightbulb went off. Before that, I’d spent a year cycling with no gains at all and had pretty low energy.
My new Doc worked with me to investigate the issue with low ferritin, and we still haven’t solved it. Oral supplementation doesn’t work for me, so I’ve had to resort to iron infusions. Pretty lame. Overall my hemoglobin numbers looked ‘normal’ , but what I’m learning is that many of these markers of ‘normal’ are insufficient for athletes or people wanting to actually train and recover properly.
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This is really important. Finding a good doctor who has worked with, and understands athletes is as important as the blood tests themselves. The doc I saw made mention that I might need a muscle biopsy at some point if my muscular fatigue doesn’t get corrected. Not saying she’s wrong, but that raised an eyebrow.
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I’ve went to a board certified sports medicine doc and even they were not that well trained with cycling specific issues. They were better though than a primary. Us amateurs probably have little access to the kind of docs that work with elite level athletes day in and day out even though we may come up with some of the same problems.
My kid had high CK levels which was due to a medication he was taking (acutane). We had to discontinue it because he wasn’t going to stop sports.
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Same. Then someone passes me. I can all of a sudden find Watts.
I think this is the reason to get recovery boots. I don’t like being cold but hey why not?
I have the normatec elite legs. They don’t make you cold, and I don’t think any of the products in that list would. They’re essentially inflatable air sacs. I use them a lot, but I cannot say they help much. They are very expensive and I use them a ton to justify the cost, but as I mentioned I’ve not noticed any major benefits. The one benefit is that It forces me to sit there and relax for 30 minutes or whatever.
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Might get for my wife. Tell her it’s a 60 minute a day thing. Please sit here. I’ll be back 
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All Anecdotal, but a couple months ago I was feeling I wasn’t quite recovering as well as I wanted. Failed some workouts I thought I shouldn’t have. Could have been that I didn’t do as much volume over the winter and early spring because of the shitty weather.
But, I did some blood tests - Ferritin of 38, Low Folate, Low B12. Last year by mid summer my Ferritin had dropped to 30, so I started supplementing for all three. 2 x Vitron C every other day (Vitamin C is important for Iron Absorption), plus a Thorne Multi that has Folate and B12 in it. There are also some studies that show better absorption from iron every other day because of the hepcidin response.
I also take Thorne Magnesium, Vitamin D every night. Fish oil morning and night, but none of that is new.
I’m a couple months now, and have been recently having the feeling that things are starting to click again. Even when I have some hard workouts, I’ve been having the kicking ass and taking names feeling again.
So - no idea if it’s actually related. But, subjectively I’m feeling better than I was a couple months ago.
(Warning: Don’t supplement iron without blood tests, too much is a bad thing!)
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Have you gotten any ferritin tests lately to see if you have recovered it? I’ve tried a bunch of oral supplementation and nothing seems to work for me. Trying to figure out gut absorption issues at the moment. I do have an allergy to mammal meat which does make getting adequate iron quite a bit more challening.
No. But I’ve heard it can be months to recover levels. In all likelihood, my next test will be in August.
I have 100% heard that Vitamin C is important for absorption - Andy Galpin has commented on this. I think it was something like 50-100mg of Vitamin C at the same time. I’ve also heard that too much iron shuts down absorption (hepcidin response?) and when my PCP prescribed me Ferrous Sulfate last year, it was every other day, I think for this reason.
You did say sleep is very good but I don’t know what that means and what is good for you. When I have felt like this before it was often a sleep issue whether interrupted or just not enough. You probably need a lot.
Are you doing any strength training? It can fatigue the heck out of you.
I wouldn’t classify my sleep as good, I take that back. It’s consistent, but I don’t wake up feeling all that rested most mornings. I did have my cortisol checked and it was normal at that time. My doc suggested a sleep study just to rule out any sleep disorders.
I did a ride today just to see how thing were feeling. I noticed that my HR was 5-10 BPM slower than I normally see at this wattage range. RPE was also way down and non-existent the few times I did push into sweet spot and threshold it felt really easy.
So that is seemingly a good sign, and I’m cautiously optimistic that maybe I was deeply functionally overreached and some supercompensation will come after this rest.
The plan is to keep my rides very easy for the next week or so and continually evaluate. At some point I do have to go hard, just not sure when that will be. I’m an expert at taking 1 step forward and 2 steps back.
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You mentioned running, but your calendar doesn’t show any running. Had you been doing any running in those 6 weeks? If so, adaptive training wasn’t setting it and thus wouldn’t be accounting for it.
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