I recently had a rest week as I have just finished a decent block of riding and also had to be in the office more (I do most of my training at home in my lunch hour). I know from experience that I find rest weeks hard, or, more specifically, training after the rest week.
I had an easy week, easy 10km rides to the office several times and a long cafe ride at the weekend, got extra sleep and yoga in and minimal other life stress. Despite this getting back on the bike feels horrible, intervals are hard (iāve dropped down ~1-2 level for my workout and even then theyāve gone from Hard to All Out). I know it takes me a good ~2 weeks to recover from a rest week, before I start feeling as good and hitting the same numbers as I did before a rest week. I also donāt see any sort of bump after that, so itās not like theyāre worth it in the long run.
I am curious if other people have similar experiences? I was triggered to ask as in the last episode of the podcast I was listening too they were extolling the virtues of a rest week and how amazing they are. I find them very hard and I donāt seem to see any benefit, just a loss of consistency.
Very similar. I can look at my Strava and pinpoint every week-long vacation (we typically travel, go on cruises, etc) for the last two years and verify about 2 weeks to get back where I was.
YOu simply may not need as much rest as what you are taking, hence the reason you are taking longer to get back to speed.
Weeks are an artificial construct when it comes to trainingā¦it makes it easyt os chedule things, but may not be the correct time periods for some.
You might try upping the intensity a bit on the weekend rides of your rest weeks. I find that gives me a little nudge to be ready to get back to serious workouts the next week. For me, 3-5 days of recovery is usually sufficient (Mon - Fri), so I āprime the pumpā a bit on the weekend.
Every rest week turns into three for me. Iām much better if I can keep riding. The whole 3 weeks on, one week off structure doesnāt work for me.
Iām much more consistant if I take rest days (1-3) as needed. Longer makes getting back hard. Fatigue from riding isnāt really that much of an issue that way for me.
Iāll be the contrarian just to show weāre all different. If I donāt take rest weeks, I crash and burn. Every single time I say āoh, I know youāre exhausted, but just push through one more weekā, I end up regretting it, becoming exhausted, and taking extended time off or extended easy/low volume weeks.
Like @Power13 though, I usually tend to take it easy M-F and then get in a long easy ride on Sat and/or Sun to āprimeā the upcoming week.
Iām the contrary: After a rest week (usually 4-5 full rest days) I feel great. The first workout RPE is higher (body screaming āitās hardā), but the power is here. After a warm up workout/phase I usually feel stronger than before the rest week.
I personally like rest weeks for the mental break more than anything. Looking forward to a few days completely off the bike every few weeks helps me get on it when Iām training. I like riding, but if I just rode 6 days a week until the cows came home, that would probably change.
I take Sundays completely away from the bike, and then most of my rest weeks have 2 or 3 days away, rest is zone 1 or shorter endurance than normal.
Yes, I did as well. I had to experiment with my rest week volume/intensity to see what helps me recuperate but not feel overly āflatā after the week. Iāve sort of settled on volume thatās roughly 60-75% of the last blocks volume at mostly an āenduranceā pace, as well as including just a bit of intensity towards the end of each of the endurance rides. Nothing structured per se, but maybe hanging on to a āfastā group ride for the last 15-20 minutes of a rideā¦ or doing a few sprints here and there during the ride. It may be my age, but as a 50+ y/o I found that when I completely took out every bit of intensity during the rest week, Iād not only quickly lose that top end, but it would take 2+ weeks to recover. Alternatively, I have friends that come back without an issue taking the full week off with absolutely no riding. I think itās just experimenting to see what works for your physiology and training status.
I welcome the rest week after the training blocks, but I also find that the first week back is tough, especially if the first workout is a VO2 max or threshold workout. As much as I enjoy and need that break, it also disrupts that week-to-week training rhythm. What I end up doing is I may schedule the easier of the two high intensity workouts to ease back in, but Iāve also just done what the plan says. Usually by that first week back on the weeked Iām firing on all cylinder again and Iām ready to go. So for me, itās about a week to a week and half.
Rest week for me is just positive. More rest means I am ready for hard work again. It could just be me as I am also one of those that can very easily go all out with no warmup. I donāt find it a challenge to do so.
I think Iāll stick to wait I know and just skip a workout if I feel I need a rest. At the moment I am time limited rather than recovery limited which I think reinforces that I shouldnāt take rest weeks. I always knew I shouldnāt but listening on the podcast about how amazing they are and how everyone should take one and if you donāt youāre missing out had me doubting myself. I need to remind myself the hosts of the podcasts do a lot more training than I can fit in, maybe for them rest weeks make more sense.
Also, to the āIf you need a rest week you train too hardā comment. I have heard Mathieu Van Der Poel very rarely takes rest weeks and instead aims to build more recovery in to his regular week than a lot of riders. Perhaps the focussing on MTB/CX/Road helps keep him motivated and the 2 rest days a week he takes keeps him physically recovered.
definitely fiddle with what youāre doing, and some great comments below (maybe too much rest, or maybe too little!)ā¦prob the former. Do you have something sharp, like openers, midweek during rest week? That helps me a lot. Getting the HR up, even though for a short amount of time, just keeps me going. I take 4 rest days and then resume training.
M off/reco
T low zone 2 (for half the duration of normal z2 ride)
W 4 quick 30s efforts by feel
Th reco ride
Fri normal z2
Sat OMG WE SURVIVED LETāS GOOOO!!!
Sun normal training
Mon reco
I have heard several different triathlon coaches say the same thing. Gradual, sustainable progress beats long/hard days that take too long to recover from. I take it for what it is, a comment about coaching professional athletes. Some of it may apply to me and some may not.
Usually program something similar for many. Might have the long weekend ride be a little bit shorter and Iāll throw in short power testing on the weekend or early the following week (I think you do the same?).
I really donāt get what OP and others talk about. I train about 10-15 hours. I usually take an easy week after my A event, which is usually a 7-8h race. The easy week is 5-6h of easy riding. Come the following weekend, I can put good pwr numbers and feel amazing.
Maybe you are not training/racing hard enough to ādeserveā a rest week.
