Loss in Fitness, Thresholds, Max V02, performance etc. with 10days off? How much will I lose?

With aerobic training you increase the number of mitochondria in the muscle cells, which is the "powerhouse" of the cell where oxidative energy breakdown takes place. You also gain myglobin, which is similar to hemoglobin. Hemoglobin pulls oxygen from the lungs and transports it to working tissues and myglobin in the muscle will pull the oxygen away from the hemoglobin. So after that long winded description of that....with 2 weeks of no exercise you will lose about 50% of the mitochondria and myglobin you gained from training. It will then take you about 4 weeks to gain that 50% back. I hope that helps.

even with biking, elliptical, and a little running (say 1 400 workout and one race in the 10 day off period)? still a loss?

No, you will not have a loss. Your body might feel a little wierd the first time you begin running again, but you will feel fine after that. There have been studies that have shown that cross training can maintain cardiovascular fitness for several weeks. With you having done two running workouts within those ten days in addition to cross training, you are definetly okay. It might just take you one or two days to get the legs rolling again.

thanks man, i needed to hear that!

I took 2 weeks off during the summer from doing my highest mileage ever, to go backpacking, which i think would be pretty good cross trainging and when i got back the first couple of days my legs were really sore but by the third day i was faster than when i left, but if you sit on your butt for 2 weeks that might be a different story....

at this point, i'm just worried because other than the harder workouts, i have not had a distance run in 9 days...that's the main thing.

why are you taking ten days off?

bothersome injury...i did an hour and 45 minutes on the bike today with some pick-ups at the end...how does that compare to, say, a 17-19 miles run? i'm coming off almost 10 weeks of around 90 miles per week so I hope that will help some.

As long as you continue to cross train, you will be fine. I would roughly try to spend the same amount of time cross training as you were running plus keep up the core work and such. Also, you will be back to running sooner if you take care of the other things - icing, heating, massage, sleep, diet, etc. Don't begin running though if your injury is still bothering you; that will just delay full recovery. Good luck.

thanks!

Look it up in the Daniels' book, he is very specific, and I have never had a problem following his guidelines. For 10 days off, he recommends 5 days easy running at 50% pre-injury mileage, then 5 days easy at 75%, and then you are back to pre-injury training. There are slight adjustments to pace also but for 10 days it is minimal. Get the book for details...

It depends on the individual. If you were pushing mileage and intensity hard with little recovery prior to injury, the first 3-5 days will probably leave you noticeably stronger than you were. In other words, absolutely no effective loss, after a day or two back.

On the other hand, if you were in a peaking phase and you'd already backed off mileage a bit over the preceding couple of weeks, you might gain from those first 3-5 days, but your base--i.e., your strength--might begin slowly to evaporate from those next 5-7 days off.

I think the case for cross training is not as strong as its made out to be, frankly. When I had a stress fracture and was forced to take 8 weeks off, I trained pretty hard for most of that time, but still found all my base eroded. It took me a long while to build back. I started in the basement.

The real answer is: nobody knows how you'll do after 10 days off. Which makes the whole comeback project a voyage of discovery. A good case could be made that you'll lose SOMETHING, since crosstraining, while it will keep your CV humming, won't stop a certain atrophying of running-specific muscle strength. So if you were pushing hard for a PR, that may not come.

Then again, who knows? I took six days completely off due to an incipient stress fracture in the middle of last fall, then got pretty quickly back to work. Within a month I'd run a fast 10K (for me) and an equally strong half marathon. Sometimes unplanned breaks are your body's way of getting what it needs.

The first couple of runs, though, should be easy, easy, easy. Give the weight bearing muscles a chance to reorient. Then you'll be fine.

You will not have any loss. No loss in VO2max comes until 15 days following cessation of exercise and all of the fitness, threshold and VO2max can be maintained for at least a month with just 3 moderate training sessions a week

good to hear...thanks! i'll let you know how it goes. i still have 12 days before the big race and am starting running today...i think i will pick up where i left off hopefully.

NOW i'm really confused...i tried to do a workout today and my pace was way off. i mean very bad on the 400's and 800's...why is that? am i really that much slower now after x-training and two workouts last week...what's going on!?

Because you didn't ease into it, like everybody suggested.

Daniels 1 Timeoff 0.

Don't get hurt.

sorry....there's just so little time left and i felt like i needed to have a good workout before my tune-up race thursday. i was worried i might be slower and needed a good workout to prove me wrong. unfortunately it did not work.

Question--was my struggle today strictly coming from lack of muscular use in the past few days and not loss of capillaries, capacity, and clood flow?