Tips for getting back on the bike after Christmas
Christmas is over, and if you practice cycling or mountain biking, a new year, a new challenge begins.
A challenge that begins with regaining physical tone, rhythm and the routine of outings, to be in shape for the first cycling tests or marches in the spring. Don't worry, you still have time, but only if you recover cycling in a coherent way. We give you 5 useful tips to resume cycling after the Christmas sweets.
5 tips to get back to cycling and mountain biking after the Christmas sweets
It's not easy to recover the time and shape lost if this Christmas you have unleashed. We already advised how to control these dates some aspects so that they did not affect your cycling, your shape, your routine. If you ignored them and think that training at Christmas is for cowards, now it's time to make an extra effort, which we are going to try to summarize in 5 very useful guidelines. Pay attention:
- Recover your healthy eating habits. We plan our eating routine again so that it accompanies the cycling we are going to practice. If you have made some kind of excess, don't torment yourself, everything is recoverable. That's right, you can start with your diet rich in fruits, vegetables and as pure proteins as possible. Also, think about your 5 daily meals and, of course, plan your intakes on training or test days differently: you will burn more, you will demand more, so you should plan better. Your body is smart, and it will quickly return to its previous habits.
- Draw up a progressive training plan, and don't even try to recover too quickly. Cycling is like this, the form is gained gradually and progressively, and it is lost in a bad week. But that little bit of form and finesse is quickly recovered as long as you don't force your body to make an effort for which it would be prepared before Christmas, but for which it is not right now. Your mountain bike or your road bike can wait for you to demand more, but start step by step.
- In relation to the previous one, don't forget to dedicate the first 3 or 4 outings to regain the illusion of going out (if you have forgotten it), to ride in a calm, paused way, without demands. It's like recovering from an injury: don't pretend to demarrage at the first change, in the first port that presents itself. Go out without pressure, roll, add kilometers in your legs, and little by little you will be burning the excesses, recovering the physical tone and, above all, the mental attitude necessary for what is coming.
- Don't pressure yourself, we link with the end of the previous advice. Your road bike and your mountain bike, your fat and your skinny, are not in a hurry. Neither should you. The demands in a low state of form only cause frustration. Any training planning has a lot to do with expectations: if you create a too high ceiling, the pressure will prevent you from enjoying and gaining real form; if you don't set a goal, you won't advance; so try to be realistic and coherent and avoid letting your guard down, but also pressuring yourself too much. Cycling is also a mental state, don't forget.
- The gym can help you. The cold has not yet left us, bad weather can occur and sedentary lifestyle prevents you from breaking that barrier to go out on a bike or mountain bike. Well, think about indoor, the gym can help you. The training tables that can facilitate you, the guide of good monitors and the versatility of activities that exist today in gyms, will surely inspire you and help you get out of the routine of pedaling nothing more. In addition, it will get you in shape and activate muscles that you had forgotten. Don't discard this option.
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A huge tip to get back to cycling
Logic. Common sense. That's the advice. Don't overdo it, keep in mind that you will have lost physical shape if you have been standing. Don't try to recover all at once what you have lost in two weeks. Forget about extreme workouts like training on an empty stomach, or extra long and demanding marathons. Leave aside the crazy accumulations, the very hard ports. Calm, patience, dedication, perseverance and time. Cycling is like this, it is made up of that. Going out on your bike or mountain bike and recovering shape requires consistency and time, don't forget.