Cycling after recovering from Covid 19

[i24]

A number of hubbers have reported in the Covid threads that they, or their family members contracted the bug. I am sure many more cyclists have been exposed. Hopefully most did not suffer severe symptoms or get hospitalised and by now, many will have recovered. Getting fit and cycling again is the next step.

 

This thread is document the experiences of hubbers, their families and friends when they resume cycling and training after recovering from Covid 19. Please keep other Covid discussions to other threads!

 

I will discus my personal experiences in a following post.

 

[i24]

My own experience is that my teenage daughter got nasty "flue" symptoms, including muscle pains and some loss of taste, back in July. We contacted our GP and he advised that she was probably suffering from Covid. But due to her age and mild symptoms, she did not qualify for getting tested. She did not require medical treatment but she isolated for 14 days. We were advised that even if she was not 100% recovered after this time, she would no longer be infectious. My my wife and I had no symptoms but quarantined for the same period too. We were not tested as we were asymptomatic.

 

First day out of quarantine, my wife and I went cycling. We went on a local ride which included a modest climb (about 200m elevation). I nearly passed out by the time I got to the top. I felt nauseas rather than short of breath, but just not well! I had to sit down on the side of the road for a while to recover before I could coast down the hill back back home.

 

So it is likely that I had also caught the bug. I also noticed some other symptoms, like muscle pains and my resting heart rate went up from 60 to 70 bpm (sometimes more).

 

I took another 4 weeks off exercise before I tried cycling again and then started with very short rides and taking it very easy on the hills. That was two months ago and things are slowly returning to normal. My daughter, who was running before lockdown, has now started cycling. She still mentions chest pains - which was one of the symptoms she had with the flue.

 

I am not a competitive cyclists. I don't go very fast, but can cover fair distances. I have been cycling regularly for the last 15 years and I am generally healthily fit, but definitely not athletic. It is going to take a while before I get back to my previous level of fitness.

 

[The Crazy German]

My own experience is that my teenage daughter got nasty "flue" symptoms, including muscle pains and some loss of taste, back in July. We contacted our GP and he advised that she was probably suffering from Covid. But due to her age and mild symptoms, she did not qualify for getting tested. She did not require medical treatment but she isolated for 14 days. We were advised that even if she was not 100% recovered after this time, she would no longer be infectious. My my wife and I had no symptoms but quarantined for the same period too. We were not tested as we were asymptomatic.

 

First day out of quarantine, my wife and I went cycling. We went on a local ride which included a modest climb (about 200m elevation). I nearly passed out by the time I got to the top. I felt nauseas rather than short of breath, but just not well! I had to sit down on the side of the road for a while to recover before I could coast down the hill back back home.

 

So it is likely that I had also caught the bug. I also noticed some other symptoms, like muscle pains and my resting heart rate went up from 60 to 70 bpm (sometimes more).

 

I took another 4 weeks off exercise before I tried cycling again and then started with very short rides and taking it very easy on the hills. That was two months ago and things are slowly returning to normal. My daughter, who was running before lockdown, has now started cycling. She still mentions chest pains - which was one of the symptoms she had with the flue.

 

I am not a competitive cyclists. I don't go very fast, but can cover fair distances. I have been cycling regularly for the last 15 years and I am generally healthily fit, but definitely not athletic. It is going to take a while before I get back to my previous level of fitness.

Recovery will depend a lot from person to person. One of my mates is still feeling helt back 6 months after.

Myself I most likely got it late february, not tested cos all hell was still to break loose. Fatigue, snot muscle pain loss of smell(which back then was not on the symptoms list) no real fever though). My legs felt like I had done 200 k's and gone out hard whilst I had almost not ridden for 2-3 weeks.

 

During recovery did some running (5k's) and short rides(as we where now in lockdown) Two months of this basic riding I was less then 10% of my power output of 2019(I was down on that one already before I got ill)

[ChrisF]

i24 this seems to affect everybody differently, and vastly so ....

 

 

A friend got it pre lockdown. Spent about 2 weeks in ICU. Slow recovery.

 

Later in lockdown another friend got diagnosed. 4 in the house, all 4 tested positive. 1 completely assymptomatic. 2nd had minimal symptoms, but took more than 2 months to get past the chest issues. 3rd was pretty ill, but managed on meds and was not admitted to hospital. 4th sadly passed away after a few weeks in hospital.

 

 

One of our contractors was diagnosed during stage 3 lockdown. After 3 cources of anti.biotics he is still not fully recovered.

 

A collegue showed symptoms on 22 September, and was diagnosed after the long weekend. He passed away 6 days later.

 

 

From this small sample group the recoveries varied, and no obvious link to age, fitness levels, asthma, smoking. Some of the perceived higher risk group suffered for a few weeks, while some of those perceived to be younger and healthier struggled for a few months .... then again, maybe the later group notices it more just because they are more active.

 

Certainly no clear pattern.