Recovering from endurance events

PennStateChick

Ok, so let me start by saying that I know everyone is different, but I am just looking for some ideas from others that have went through a similar situation.

Over the weekend, (Thursday-Sunday), I literally was on my bike for close to 8 hours a day. I participated in the Pan Ohio Hope Ride. This is a 4 day, 340ish mile ride across Ohio. As you can assume, I burned A LOT of calories over the weekend. Because of this, I ate A LOT of food. We had water breaks / food options every 10-25 miles. We literally ate 4 meals a day plus snacks.

Anyhow, I spent all day yesterday just wanting to eat EVERYTHING in sight. I counted, but didn't care that I was over by quite a few calories. I figured that I was exhausted mentally / physically and just couldn't worry about the extra 2000 calories I ate.

Anyhow, now, here it is Tuesday and I am still struggling with the urge to eat constantly. I am actually hungry (not just craving) so I have been allowing myself some leeway.

I gained about 4 pounds as a result of the ride (Yes, I know it's water retention and whatnot while my muscles repair, etc). However, I am now not riding (giving myself some time off to recover), and need to get my calories back on track for days that I am not that active. I don't want the 4 pounds of water to disappear and leave behind 4 pounds of fat.

So the question is - after really intense events like this, how long does it take for you to recover mentally / physically and start eating normally again? Also, do you allow yourself some overages during the week following these types of events??

PennStateChick

bump?

DavidMartinez2

This is why people say marathon training makes you gain weight. Doing endurance events like this cranks you appetite up and you want to eat everything in sight. You justify it to yourself by saying "I just rode my bike 300 miles, I can eat that". Having one big meal after is fine, continuing long term is not. The days after a marathon I normally reduce the intensity of my workouts for a few days but I do not stop completly.

PennStateChick

Yea, I'd like to still be exercising, but I wrecked my bike during the event and hurt my knee... which means, no running / cycling for a couple days. I've still been walking, but it's been slow and I don't really pay attention to calories burned from walking.

Chainbreaker

First, congratulations on such an epic ride! Your body is I a deep deficit and extremely broken down at this point. Food is an important aspect to recovery from such a huge muscular output. Ideally one would track calories spent and recover those on an a daily basis (as much as possible). A good example is Michael Phelps and his notorious 12,000 cal a day intake during training. Sometimes it does take higher volume foods, regularly considered crap, to hit that.

It may take several days to catch up such a burn, BUT this is not a license to eat everything in sight. Eat plenty of good food with lots of protein and listen to your body. If your famished there is clearly more recovery to do. Things should normalize in a few days.

Exercise- light walking or low impact cardio to flush the lactic acid buildup out until you feel good again.

stefa711

You're starving because your body hasn't caught up to the amount of calories you burned! You may have felt like you were eating as much as you were burning, but I'm willing to bet you didn't even come close. If you're truly hungry I suggest you feed your body! (this happened to me for about 2 days after my most recent marathon)

Eat healthy, whole foods and when your body has caught up, it'll let you know.

ETA: I would suggest you don't calorie count for a few days. I'm not saying eat everything in sight, just eat normal portions when you are hungry and don't stress about the calories! Again, your body needs the extra fuel, so feed yourself!

iplayoutside19

I did a 12 hr Adventure Race in the spring. It took me 3 days to get back in sync with normal eating habits. You rode for 4 days. I'd give yourself at least a week before really trying to be "normal" again.

PennStateChick

Thanks everyone. This is all kind of what I was thinking, but I wanted to make sure I wasn't just crazy! :-)

AzGilrock

I created a theory for myself for long exercise events. I do a lot of bike rides that last 3-4 hours. Usually I'm not supplying my body with enough energy to keep up with the calories burned during the ride. So my theory is that after the first 45min to an hour my body has used up the stored glycogen in the muscles and I'm in fat burning mode. I don't believe in eating back calories burned during the fat burning stage. If my bike computer says I burned 3000 calories I'm not going to go home and eat 3000 calories. The goal is to lose weight so only eat back enough that you don't feel starving and go back to your normal budget the next day.