I'm currently suffering from a performance drop and I'm trying to figure out whether it's overtraining, super compensation, overreaching, low grade infection or possibly allergies etc...
Some background.
I've been cycling approximately 60-80 mile weeks for the last 2 years (in addition to running and swimming for tri's). Approx 10 weeks ago I started concentrating on cycling exclusively with a training program put together by a forum racer (a friend at work). The first several weeks were all aerobic workouts (base building) which I had very little of up to then. The training had been going very well building myself up to 150+ weeks. Then I took 3 days off (wed-fri) and took my family to the coast for vacation. When I got back I started right back up. On Sat I did a 1 1/2 aerobic ride, followed on Sunday by a 3 1/2 aerobic ride (which was the third weekend to do this ride). Everything was fine during these rides and in fact I felt better on the long ride then the previous two weekend's. Then on Monday I did 1 1/4 aerobic ride. During this ride I noticed that my heart rate was roughly 20 beats lower than normal. I manually checked my HR on this ride 4 times thinking it was the watch but it checked each time correctly. I feel 100% confident about my findings because I've been working out religiously with the hr monitor, have developed a very good feel for perceived effort vs. hr, plus the Monday's ride is a ride I do all the time and know where my HR should be for each section of the course. So we (my coach and I) changed the rest the weeks schedule. I rested Tuesday and was scheduled to go out for a 2.5 hour ride Wed. The deal was if within the first 20-30 min my HR was abnormal to turn around and come back. I started out on the ride and noticed the hr was better than on Monday. But approximately 30 min into the ride there's a gentle climb and I know where my HR should be and it was still a good 5+ beats low, so I decided to turn around. I rested Thursday. I started taking my morning RHR but I would summarize it as inconclusive since I hadn't been taking it prior. It appears that from Tuesday to Thur my RHR came down 2-3 beats (maybe). I then did a 1 1/4 aerobic ride Friday and my HR seemed to have returned to normal on the ride. But I noticed that nearing the end of the ride I had that strung out feeling where you feel a little oxygen starved (although my HR didn't seem to be effected by it). The rest of the day I felt a little bit tired.
I've been researching every night this week trying to figure out how to tell between overtraining, infection, allergies etc.... It seemed to come on so suddenly between Sunday and Monday that I felt most of the week that it must be some viral/bacterial thing that didn't show itself through fever. If it was overtraining I would suspect you would see at least a decrease over a few days not feeling fine Sunday then 20 beats lower Monday. I also know that I suffer from Mold allergies and they effect me in different ways throughout the year. They have been very heavy the past several days and I've been trying to find out (through records) if I can see when they started to get heavy and correlate it to the performance drop.
So after that long winded background I don't know:
1. If the 3 days at the coast had something to do with it?
2. This is overtraining
3. Allergies
4. Infection
As far as the overtraining symptoms go, I would say I have several but I don't have a lack of enthusiasm towards riding. In fact quite the opposite, I've been getting a little down thinking that I might have to take a few more days off.
Any insight would be greatly appreciated.