Quote Originally Posted by Veronica View Post
You've been compared yourself to the group. Are they getting faster?

Veronica
That's a good point. After a particularly hard ride a few weeks ago I looked up last year journal and saw that at the same time last year we were averaging 15 mph over the same routes. This year we are in the upper 16's or even into the 17's. I'm able to keep up on the flats but not the hills.

It's not necessarily about overtraining, it's that your muscles are literally torn to pieces during your workouts and they need rest time to rebuild and get stronger. Less so when you're young, but even so.
This too is a good point. But I thought that active rest would let them repair...but maybe I'm being a bit too active. I do work up a pretty good sweat on those days.

It's best to take a "rest day" from severe caloric restriction too, so that your metabolism doesn't just scale itself down. Eat the way you normally would on your rest days.
I don't think a 500 cal. deficit will cause my metabolism to scale itself down...that's not much of a restriction....which is why I chose it...slow and steady weight loss.

So much to think about.......