|   Day before a race | rcron
Dec 18, 2003 7:50 PM | | Just wondering what the current thinking was with regards to riding the day before a race. I generally take Friday as an off day and go for a road ride on the Saturday, then race on Sunday. I feel fine for the race, and anytime I have ridden Friday and taken Saturday as the off day, I feel a little flat for raceday. I would love to know why this is BTW, it seems counter intuitive.
Any Ideas?
Ron |
| re: Day before a race | Dwayne Barry
Dec 19, 2003 5:11 AM | | Well, conventional wisdom from road racing is just what you've experienced. That is, easy or off day 2 days before and then a ride the day before race day, usually with a couple of threshold-like efforts.
The only physiological explanation I've come across is that many of the glycolytic enzymes have very short half-lives. If this is the case, maybe taking the day off lowers the glycolytic capacity of the muscle whereas riding the day before keeps them topped-off? Another idea, is perhaps a glycogen storage issue. Pretty sure increased glycogen storage is one of the first adaptations to endurance exercise which suggests to me that it's quite labile. Maybe not riding the day before results in a lower muscle glycogen content come race day (which is totally counter-intuitive)? |
| Thanks Dwanye | rcron
Dec 21, 2003 10:48 AM | | That is what I'm thinking as well that there is some sort of mechanism that diminishes with a day off before race day that remains elevated if some activity is done prior.
Thanks again
Ron |
| Thanks Dwanye | refuel
Dec 22, 2003 11:41 AM | | I think the system that needs the hard efforts the day before is either the cardio or muscular (or both together). Riding hard the day before allows the heartrate to come up fast and generally makes you feel better at hard efforts on raceday. |
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