Really frustrating sesh on the bike today
Ok, so had a day off yesterday and managed to leave work early to get on the bike whilst the sun was shining.
Usually do weekday sesssions on the rollers and weekend ones outside, and never have any issues going between the 2.
Today I did a route I've done before - this time though it was 2x 12 (z4) and then rest z3. Managed to first 15 happily in z4 with a little blip as I had to wait for some traffic. Second set, could I get my HR up? NO. Pedalling like crazy, really pusing msyelf averaged 4bpm less and covered z2 - z4 throughout the 15mins! Was a little bit more downhill that the previous interval but then couldn't really get my HR up for the rest of the ride and really had to work to keep it in z3. Bit bummed really, despite being faster than usual. Could tiredness trigger this? I had quite a heavy weekend workout wise, Bike - run brick (sat) and swim to run session (sun). Anyone else suffer anything similar? Any tips?!
Comments
Charlotte,
I'll let some of the HR athletes chime in with hopefully more useful advice to you, but to answer some of your basic questions, no, you are certainly not the only person to experience this. Your HR can be influenced by a wide variety of factors including stress, diet, environmental conditions, amount of sleep, overall fatigue, and of course the work it is doing to propel you forward. In the case of our training, we are really more concerned with that last part (how hard am I working?) but all sorts of external factors can skew your results.
This is usually where a power athlete such as myself would launch into a lecture about the benefits of training with power and how it is a pure objective measurement that is free from all of these corruptive external influences. But the truth is that's not quite true either. Sure, using power certainly gives you a lot more objective and direct measure of the work you are doing, and in your case it may very well have shown that you were doing every bit as much work (or more) on your second interval as you did on your first. But, even with power, it also may have shown that you just had a rough interval and couldn't get your Watts or HR up for any number of likely temporary reasons.
Agreed it's frustrating, but it happens to all of us from time to time , fancy gadgets or not.
I'll add to what Trevor has said, I am a HR guy. I consider my HR one data point to consider as I'm judging my effort on the bike. I think its important as a HR person to also always consider your PRE, pressure on the legs, pressure on the feet, and somehow do a mental math equation to determine what "real" effort zone your in. HR isn't a solid measurement like a watt from a power meter. You mentioned you got out of work and went outside instead of being inside. This was a change in your routine which could have impacted your HR readings..I notice that if I workout in the afternoon versus the morning my HR is different and not always in the same direction different to make it even worse. I also really notice if I'm tired or if I've had any coffee or soda in the past hour or so prior to working out.
Either way, don't let one workout frustrate you to much...we've all been there... As you said, you were pedaling like crazy...most people who get out of work early head for the couch versus grabbing their bike...