The appliance of science

You might not be able to tell from all the metrics posts, or the training graph summary, but I can currently running myself into the ground with LEJOG training. If my stats are to be believed, since the 9th of February there have only been four days when I haven't cycled at all. Now I'm not a young buck any more, so whilst it pains me to admit it, I cannot lie - I am finding this very hard. So hard, in fact, that I'm clutching at any straw, however fragile, that might help make things better. Specifically I've been off down the rabbit hole of trying things that give elite athletes the kind of marginal "extra 1%" gains that shouldn't really make the least bit of difference to a middle-aged plodder like me.

So, if I'm going on a long ride I won't take a bottle of water with me, but a bottle of electrolyte sports drink with a sugar-free caffeine hit (I like the caffeine as it makes up for the fact that I can't have a cup of tea on the ride). On especially long rides, I might stop and slurp an energy gel too, even though the specific benefits for me are probably negligible, and I'd much rather eat a flapjack.

Because I'm cycling pretty much every day, I don't have much recovery time between rides. You might be able to get away with this. I might have been able too, when I was younger. But I'm struggling now. Basic sports anatomy - muscles tear during exercise, and build back (stronger) during recovery time. No recovery time equals no building back and no getting stronger. So once more I've reached out a desperate hand to science, or commercialised sports "science" at least, in the hope that it can help. After a long of particularly arduous ride, I now have a surprisingly not-horrible vanilla-flavoured rapid recovery drink called Rego, because it can't hurt, right? And if my legs are particularly leaden, I'll spend my waking hours wearing a rather fetching pair of compression sleeves on my calves, exerting 20-30mmHg of pressure to stimulate blood-flow and aid recovery, apparently. I'm sceptical but, again, it can't hurt. If nothing else, they feel warm and supportive. And besides, a placebo effect is still an effect, right?

If I get to the point of having ice baths, you have my permission to give me a slap though, okay?