Fitness will not disappear overnight
Fitness will not disappear overnight
The most important thing to remember when you are off the bike with an illness, according to Gallagher, is not to panic – especially if you have built a good fitness base in the preceding months.
A strong base will stand you in good stead when you look to return and is reason for keeping your discipline and not rushing back too soon.
“A lot of how your body will respond comes down to the consistency of your previous training,” Gallagher said.
“We have had pretty much that exact question to our coaches. One guy, for example, was worried he was going to lose all of the fitness he had been building up but the fact was he had had four months of consistent training with little to no illnesses and interruptions.
“When you get back, for the first couple of days then you may feel some sort of impact while your body gets back into it and your system adapts again.
“If you have taken a couple of days off then you will return with very little impact on your fitness. If it has been a week, then maybe there will be a few days before you’re back to a strong level but then you’ll be back to a top level soon enough.
“It’s what we see on a regular basis. Riders who train regularly will take less time to recover because they have that memory in the bank to fall back on. Taking a couple of days off will have little effect on your fitness.
“By contrast, if you are someone who has been someone quite inconsistent then it can be longer to get back to your target level of fitness.”
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