I remember when I first started - the awkward shuffles down the stairs as well as the sore quads at the end of the first big day on a cycling holiday.
But day to day I don’t experience DOMS of any significant intensity.
However, I went on a group ride the other day with faster folk than I’d usually ride with and I had to push pretty hard to keep up at points. No where near as long as usual (3hrs), but very punchy on a few hills. The two following days, I have some of the worst DOMS I’ve experienced in my calf muscles.
Perhaps it was because I had a 4 day break previous, I didn’t cool down enough, or even a symptom of fighting something off… but it got me wondering, am I pushing myself hard enough, often enough if it’s never enough to cause DOMS?
I’m just interested to hear other people’s views and experiences on the subject.
I don’t think you should be getting DOMS regularly from your “normal” training plan. It’s not something that I’ve heard of from any experienced bike racers I’ve been around. Fatigue or the “empty” feeling in the legs that @Hristo described is more common.
The only times I’ve personally felt much in terms of DOMS from cycling was when I’ve had to go SUPER deep – typically from very hard efforts in long road races where I’ve been up against riders much, much stronger than me. Those kinds of rides take a LOT out of you, though – and it’s certainly not something that can/should be done frequently. It takes a lot of time to recover from those kinds of rides, which throws the rest of your training off-track.
Consistency over time is the biggest key to gaining fitness – in my experience, these types of efforts derail my consistency.
No DOMS from normal riding. But I don’t go long anymore bc of life constraints. If I go out and do 3-4hrs, I’ll have heavy legs the next day, but nothing like doing squats in the gym, milder. I did some hard 3 min efforts the other day and felt it in the calves, but again that’s not normal riding for me. If you’re actually doing a normal ride for you and getting DOMS, you might not be eating right to recover or something like that. However, I get DOMS almost every time I lift, but I just do it once a week and go pretty heavy, so it’s prob something my body can’t cope with. Maybe your regular but long rides are the same
Did you by any chance get new shoes or play with cleat position btw? I was testing out some cleat positions due to knee discomfort, and did a ride with my cleats a bit forward. Got noticeable calf doms on a pretty chill ride.
Sounds like you’re not doing much in the way of short power work. Certainly when you’re out on the road dealing with punchy efforts, a lot of people start recruiting their calves a bit more than normal, but it is possible this is a fit issue as well as unless you are a pure sprinter, calf recruitment isn’t necessarily a goal, and can be caused by “reaching” for the pedals.
Either way, not enough info here to determine if you’re not pushing yourself enough in training. More likely you’re just not doing a specific kind of work in training, and this ride exposed that.
Whether or not that is a limiter for you that you should train is up to you and your goals. There are benefits to anaerobic “punchy” training for a lot of people, some people respond very well to it and see gains across the board. Other people, it’s kind of a waste of time and just incurs excess fatigue as a long term cost.