. It would be very handy to have an antibody test and know for sure what has been going on.

Readily available in the UK in various places like this:

Corona Virus Testing

Readily available in the UK in various places like this:

Isn’t there a problem that none of them have been particulalry accurate?

And unless there’s persistent immunity as a result then its unfortunately pointless anyway.

Still inching back towards some sort of normal here. My HR is still elevated and relatively modest strolls – under an hour – wipe me out next day, but the shortness of breath is mostly gone as is the cough. Not riding the bike yet, it seems pointless. No training effect, but runs down the battery.

Anyway, this is interesting for anyone going through as very slow recovery process from what is / probably is / might be Covid-19. Seems like a significant number of people are experiencing prolonged symptoms that go way beyond the ‘official’ one or two week recovery, but I guess we knew that already:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/15/weird-hell-professor-advent-calendar-covid-19-symptoms-paul-garner?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_WhatsApp

Having had many of the symptoms and taking 5 weeks to feel almost back to normal, I was 99% sure I had the virus.

This week my employer paid for us to take the anti-body test……..it came back negative!

Still no clearer as to whether I’ve had it but either way that might suggest no immunity if no anti-bodys detected

I was about to post that article @badlywireddog

Again matches my experiences of whatever I’ve had. Albeit on an actually shorter time frame.

Although I guess he could have written that in one of the “I feel ok now” windows

What test did you use Gav?

@69er_Gav Which test though? Some give far more reliable results than others!

Today is the 8th week “anniversary” of my first day of feeling really rubbish on Saturday 21st March, four days after I came home from work to my better half coughing continuously (the day our first of two isolation periods began, we went back to work after 14 days but she had a bad relapse after a week and was given antibiotics while being off for a further ~2.5 weeks, during which I was told to isolate again to protect her in case she didn’t have COVID-19 during the first isolation period).

The short version is, despite never getting more than relatively mild symptoms compared to my better half, I’m still not completely over it (I’m still struggling to try to get back the fitness I lost) and neither is she.

Some days I’ve been able manage a sub 25min effort in the past couple of weeks around my lowered FTP of 280W compared to 294W in Feb, but other days I’ve felt so wiped out I’ve not jumped on the turbo at all, while other days I’ve tried to ride at race pace and my legs/lungs have given up after ~10mins. Before all of this, I could go at race pace for up to several short events on a day and throw in a structured workout, sometimes after work shifts where I’ve covered ~6 miles, sometimes doing back to back days. At the moment, not a hope in hell!

My rather depressing “power and relative effort” chart, seeing my winter training from Jan to end of Feb go up in flames, which includes my cycle commutes and deliveries by foot at work…

Some days I’ve been able manage a sub 25min effort in the past couple of weeks around my lowered FTP of 280W compared to 294W in Feb, but other days I’ve felt so wiped out I’ve not jumped on the turbo at all, while other days I’ve tried to ride at race pace and my legs/lungs have given up after ~10mins. Before all of this, I could go at race pace for up to several short events on a day and throw in a structured workout, sometimes after work shifts where I’ve covered ~6 miles, sometimes doing back to back days. At the moment, not a hope in hell!

If it makes you feel better, the last time I rode a bike my power output at 120bpm was an average 70 watts for 20 minutes and I spent the next two days recovering from the effort. Before all this, my FTP was a little shy 0f 300 watts 🙂

Bit of an update and something of a revisit of some older posts.

I’ve never really trained to a power or relative effort – or trained really. Experiences of virus on power are back in the early pages. I was more shocked at the massive drop than anything else for what I thought were mild symptoms. It just didn’t seem to fit right with what was being said about the virus at the time.

What I’ve worked out over the past couple of months – my body is on trickle charge. Energy levels build and improve week on week. It is also really easy to chew through the whole lot in one go if I’m not careful. Probably the biggest factor in improving was being put in Furlough at Easter. Not having to focus on being able to actually get through my work to hit a deadline and move to resting.

I don’t like sitting still but have really forced myself to do this a lot. It has paid dividends although I still have to remember to do this to prevent chewing through the energy reserves. Although these are now higher they are not to previous levels.

One of the advantages of being in a small community is I’ve been able to get out and walk twice a day. Yes – breaks the rules – honestly I feel little and often exercise has helped get my fitness up. Not sure how I would have been able to do it living in anything other than a really small village. Even then it’s been a case of going very early and very late in the day to avoid meeting people. These gentle strolls have made a big difference. I now wish I’d stuck on strava for each walk – just so I could look back at how my walking has changed. I now feel just walking about is pretty much normal. Did take a walk up a small fell the other day. It highlighted my fitness is not what it was but it will come back.

On the bike I’m now upto 14 rides on the bike post worst symptoms – what is working for me is riding to a beat. Putting the emphasis on keeping to or more correctly below a heart rate. In my case 110bpm – worked out through trial and error. Not an approach I recommend because it was a fine line between making a mistake and being OK. Mistakes generally being having too high an expectation / or thinking oh I feel good and trying something. The other thing is time between rides – three to four days seems to work. Whilst riding actually just focusing on the ride – not the speed / movement / end – punctuates it with rests. Taking more time out to stop – take in the views, look at the flowers, enjoy the clouds.

This week I have found I am naturally rising to holding 115bpm with comfort and being able to go over 130bpm without gasping or getting back home and feeling unusual. Originally I thought I’d try one of the Zwift FTP building programmes at the start or May, then I thought June, right now I’m thinking just keep in the bottom half of Zone 2 on HR. The theory being not trying being the new trying and over time what I can do by not trying will increase.

Whilst breathing cold air is not the unpleasant experience it was a couple of weeks it is still causing a little discomfort. The return of cold air this week reminded me I was finding this an issue.

With the return to the outdoor and plenty of people having been inactive and having Covid I am wondering what impact this will have. Especially when recovery for some of us is about not running before you can walk.

What I’ve worked out over the past couple of months – my body is on trickle charge.

I’m treating my fitness like a badly discharged mobile phone battery. If you keep hammering it without allowing it to charge up fully, you just end up with… a badly discharged mobile phone battery. Small steps.

If it makes you feel better, the last time I rode a bike my power output at 120bpm was an average 70 watts for 20 minutes and I spent the next two days recovering from the effort. Before all this, my FTP was a little shy 0f 300 watts 🙂

It’s amazing how varied COVID-19 impacts different people!

I know I got off quite lucky compared to many, but I feel mightily pissed off at having a second successive of winter training written off, moreso this time because I pushed myself to my own brink in the hope of this year trying to make up for a really disappointing outdoor season in 2019.

Having only joined the “cycling for fitness gains” bandwagon just over three years ago, time is not on my side at 46 to keep punishing my body and trying to improve sustained power on top of what is currently a pretty physical job as a postie in these “stay at home, order the world from the internet times” we are in compared to a normal spring.

One of my random aims is to get a “95% of 20min” figure of 300W+, I hit 298W in early March 2019 and 294W in early Feb 2020. Trying to now improve my current 280W by another 20W feels like mission impossible, every relative good day is typically needing three easy days recovery. From how things have gone in the last couple of weeks, I might even struggle to keep hold of what I have now.

Probably one of the more unexpected things – which I’ve remembered as I’m sat in my kit ready to go for a road ride. I get a little bit anxious – probably slightly more so today as it’s the first cool / windy day.

On FTP – I went from just over 200 to not being able to hold much above 60-80watts. Latest trip to the Zwift, having avoided it for weeks, over the 100watt barrier for av power. Even went over 200 watts without my heart rate going daft. Just climbing up out of one of the undersea tunnels so nothing major.

One of my random aims is to get a “95% of 20min” figure of 300W+, I hit 298W in early March 2019 and 294W in early Feb 2020. Trying to now improve my current 280W by another 20W feels like mission impossible, every relative good day is typically needing three easy days recovery. From how things have gone in the last couple of weeks, I might even struggle to keep hold of what I have now.

Maybe backing off for a few weeks and letting your body recover properly would work better than banging your head against a viral ceiling, particularly given your job. Your goal seems a bit arbitrary as well, but really, it sounds like you need a rest. Sure, you may lose a few watts, but you’ll get them back once you’re properly well again. Honest 🙂

Having only joined the “cycling for fitness gains” bandwagon just over three years ago, time is not on my side at 46 to keep punishing my body

Nick Craig is now 50, I think, and still competitive at elite level. Just for perspective.

Just going back to trail and error – in working out what I was comfortable with for a HR. I came in too high on the first rides. Thinking 120 was fine – a whole day of unusual followed. Should have come in at 100. I have seen articles saying your body will know when it’s ready to go. I found this to be true but also I had had a reset. I worked this out by thinking go would be back to normal. As with everything about the virus there is a new normal. With hindsight I should have gone for just into zone 2 on HR. And with even more hindsight – even this could have been a risk without even knowing what my HR had been doing just basic gentle walks. In otherwords I have found a way that seems to be working for me but that doesn’t mean there aren’t risks and I was just bumbling my way out a situation without knowing or understanding them.

piemonster

What test did you use Gav?

Posted 7 hours ago

It was the Abbots antibody test. This is the blurb I was sent after i’d already been tested

I am delighted to announce that the Abbots (USA) Laboratory analyser ANTIBODY test for SARS-CoV-2, that we are providing to patients at The Health Equation, through The Doctors Laboratory, received Public Health England approval yesterday, Thursday 14th May 2020. Abbotts say the specificity of the ANTIBODY test is between 99.7 and 100%.

The Abbots Antibody test joins the Roche Antibody Test as the only 2 PHE approved SARS-CoV-2 ANTIBODY tests in the UK. Whilst the UK Government said in their press release that the ROCHE test was 100% specific, Roche themselves say it is 99.8 to 100% specific. At the moment Roche are only providing their test to the NHS.

Specificity is one thing, but surely in your case you care about sensitivity?

The Abbott ‘have I currently got it?’ test that they’ve been using in the White House a lot is apparently a bit dodgy!

https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/coronavirus-covid-19-update-fda-informs-public-about-possible-accuracy-concerns-abbott-id-now-point

Day 41 here.

I’m now at the point where I feel basically fine, so long as I don’t do anything – as noted by others, you push yourself just a bit over the line and take three steps backwards as a result.

I am working from home (desk job) and am probably going to attempt 37 hours next week. Still only doing a 20 min walk each evening though, but might try half an hour one of these days!

My neighbour is now up to 8 weeks in. He runs and races regularly, and was training 6 days a week before CV. Hasn’t been able to go for a run yet, although he’s now looking reasonably chipper.

Thought about a ride this weekend, still have a bit of a cough and a sore chest. So I have not. Will reclaim the turbo for something gentle. I’m walking the dog a bit. But need to rest in the afternoons still if I am honest.

I’m not worried about fitness loss, I’ve been laid up for three months at a time with little issue. It’s the cumulative loss as I need about 12mo for my objectives. No 12hr TTs this year I fear.

For reference, I was training at 400Km/week in January and February with a plan for assault on the trike 12hr TT title. Bah!

I’m pretty good, back at work full time (desk job from home) but also getting randomly knackered / chest issues (best I can describe is it feels ‘hollow’ and each breath feels a little lacking in O2)

And getting that feeling you get the day before you come down with something but never actually coming down with it.

This seems to happen at random, other times I’m fine. Riding around 10-13 miles mostly around 120 bpm but wouldn’t want to push much further / harder. Agree with the earlier posts about feeling like I have an energy battery and need to keep within it.

Will be fascinating to get the antibody test and I’ll be confused / annoyed if it’s negative.

I’m just coming out of something that seems like a relapse. About 3/4 days.

Malaise seems to be the right word, sore throat, cough.

All very mild, but 2.5 months in.

The other side to this, it could easily just be stress which is something that’s affected me before. But not with the sore throat, cough.

I posted in the bike forum last week about ongoing symptoms. Basically developed aches and pains at the beginning of April, followed by sore throat and cough. Cough got progressively worse and then I stared having breathing difficulties. Called 111, had a call back and advised to isolate on 16/04. Few days of bad coughing, extreme tiredness and difficulty breathing.

Started to feel more human a week or so ago so went for a bike ride. Knocked me straight on my arse. Doing my local loop which can be an hour or two door to door depending on route. Took me over an hour to do less than a third of the shortest route. Had to get off and push a few times which has never happened before. Cut short and came home.

Since then the cough has come back, numb hands and feet and no energy. Had this week off work and planned to spend time with family and do some household jobs, moving the shed amongst others. Instead I’ve spent every day sleeping. One short canal walk with my son each day and I’m ruined.

I know how lucky I am compared to a lot of people, but this is taking its toll on my mental health. Riding and other exercise help me keep depression and stress at bay and I can’t do either. Really struggling and there is no help out there. GP just said symptoms can take a bit to go away. It’s been nearly two months now.

Read this earlier and it made complete sense.

https://apple.news/AaKku9g9QS9qcQgheu5e8cA

I just want the cough, shortness of breath and extreme tiredness to piss off now. Every day tasks are very difficult to perform. Apologies for rambling, just needed to vent.

Keep venting funkmaster, it’s what the threads for.

It does seem like there’s a very long tail to this. Along with my short relapse I got Covid Toe back albeit less so than the first time.

No fever, or any noticeable heart rate or breathing issues. Some a few days of cough, fatigue aches and pains with Covid Toe just after. Odd.

For the first time in what feels like an eternity, I was able to do a short Z2 road ride after each work shift this week Mon-Weds, even throwing in some very short Z5 efforts up small inclines last night without feeling completely drained today.

Even now, I’m torn whether to pop out for a very short one, having hidden away from the sun all day… I don’t cope with heat well at all, must have drank ~3l of fluid while delivering in the midday sun yesterday for ~5 hours.

Still getting aches around the ribs, almost feeling like a relapse, but less frequent now than this time last week.

I was going to attempt a canal towpath bimble now the kids are asleep but just don’t have any energy at all. In bed now, it’s ridiculous 😀 coughing and chest aches lots.

Thought I’d had it, see post 3, wife and son had definite symptoms a week or so later. I lost sense of smell. Antibody test today (provided by company) was negative. Would have been much simpler if it was positive! Confused again.

Been feeling short of breath now for 9 weeks as above its like any deep breathing is just hollow, seem to yawn slot too. The first few weeks I had weird pains / aches in my chest but they went away but came back this week for a couple of days. I also have a weird feeling in my throat but overall I just feel short of breath, my GP thought I had a punctured lung but this was over the phone. Anyway I have since been for a check up in hospital chest x-ray, ECU, loads of other tests and all came back clear. The two doctors say everything points to Covid but they are only 95% sure this was 3 weeks ago, I have went to being pretty much riding everyday to not being on a bike for 4 weeks now, I tried to keep going but the tiredness and really bad breathing finally made me stop. It is just like a game of snakes and ladders up feeling better then all the way back down.

I know how lucky I am compared to a lot of people, but this is taking its toll on my mental health. Riding and other exercise help me keep depression and stress at bay and I can’t do either. Really struggling and there is no help out there. GP just said symptoms can take a bit to go away. It’s been nearly two months now.

I’m somewhere around week 10 of whatever it is I have – began fittingly on Friday 13 March. Have backed right off and mostly what I have left is ongoing fatigue and a HR that’s still around 20bpm high than normal, but dropping slowly. Not coughing any more. The tingling fingers. Weird chest pains mostly. High altitude shortness of breath. Random adrenaline surges. Covid (probably) insomnia. And acid reflux.. have all mostly buggered off for now.

My GP, who has been ace, says I’ll know when it feels right to get back on the bike and I’m inclined to believe him. Right now it feels like anything more than a ten minute stroll is likely to knock me back into grimness.

Anyone suffering a glacially slow recovery who wants to sanity check what they’re going through might find this FB group useful. Lots of shared odd symptoms and experiences:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/523468468545728/announcements/

ps: I found meditation unexpectedly helped with the frustration of not being able to ride. That and wariness of causing long term damage, though ECG, chest x-ray and blood tests all come back normal.

Thought I’d had it, see post 3, wife and son had definite symptoms a week or so later. I lost sense of smell. Antibody test today (provided by company) was negative. Would have been much simpler if it was positive! Confused again.

Suoerdrug are selling them now, if you want to potentially confuse yourself further. I hear you btw. Givem how screwed up I am and how weird my symptoms were, if I didn’t have covid-19, there’s something else badly wrong with me. Watch this space 🙁

Thanks for the link I’ll check it out. Going to get back in touch with GP again as my chest is quite painful tonight and the hand and feet numbness is getting worse.

I found meditation unexpectedly helped with the frustration of not being able to ride.

I agree with this 100%. Before I got COVID I was suffering from Post Concussion Syndrome – a few months of fatigue, not being able to get out of bed some days, etc. If I hadn’t been lucky enough to have been tested then I’d probably have put my symptoms down to that & seasonal allergies.

Anyway, my point is that I’ve found meditation to be really helpful with both PCS and COVID as it’s helping me keep my lack of riding in perspective.

That, and my son learning to ride his balance bike.

I’ve had a shock this morning.

A SECOND positive Covid-19 test over 5 weeks after the first.

I tested positive on 13th April and was off work for two weeks with general feelings of exhaustion, headache, loss of taste and smell etc. No cough or temperature. Resumed work on 28th April and have felt ok but tired. Other colleagues at work who had it have all reported the same.

This Wednesday was in work when I started to feel dreadful. Shortness of breath and headaches, tiredness. I only booked a test after some quite extreme nagging from colleagues and honestly thought I was wasting time and resources but went straight away.

Just had a positive result at 5.30 am today just as I was about to set off to work. Shocker. Currently at home awaiting some advice but I’m guessing I’ll be off now until I have a negative test. FFS.

What advice do you expect? 😆

You’re not leaving your home until at least next Wednesday, cancel your cross-country dash to your second home or caravan later for the bank hol weekend. 😉

Just had a positive result at 5.30 am today just as I was about to set off to work. Shocker. Currently at home awaiting some advice but I’m guessing I’ll be off now until I have a negative test. FFS.

You probably know this already, but the second positive test may mean that you’re simply still shedding inactive, but still recognisable, virus particles as your body cleans itself out rather than you still being infected with the virus in an active way and being infectious.

The symptoms you’re getting seem par for the course for a lot of us if you push yourself a little too hard during recovery. For a lot of people, the idea that you simply have this thing for a few days and get over it in a week or two is just not the case. Even my partner who had the mildest of symptoms for three or four days was still getting heart rate spikes on the bike / running weeks later. It’s a weird virus and they’re still learning about how it affects us.

I think we’re 5 weeks on and my wife still has the anosmia.

The Mrs had a test come back positive as did four others that work with her. And she says nearly 20 people in the care home she works at have died. Hospital was sending patients back.

She has had zero symptoms a week on but did have a temp three weeks earlier and isolated then too.

Me and jnr did the drive through test this week, both came back negative.

Current advice seems to be we still need to isolate but she no longer needs to!

You probably know this already, but the second positive test may mean that you’re simply still shedding inactive, but still recognisable, virus particles as your body cleans itself out rather than you still being infected with the virus in an active way and being infectious.

+1

Not viable virus, just the proteins of dead virus.

Good explanation here:

We are 99% certain we both had the virus back in mid March. I had never felt so unwell and we both had the same symptoms apart from my breathing issues, which were scary.

We both had the loss of taste and smell, mine for about 4 days, but my partners taste and smell has not returned, so the loss has been around 10 to 12 weeks.

Anyone else still have the loss of taste and smell over a long period of time?

The GP said that it should have returned after about 2 weeks, since then she did have an appointment with the ENT in September, but that has just been cancelled as they are now fully booked??!!

My missus still has the anosmia. She will get the occasional whiff of bubble bath or something, but the next day it’s gone again. That’s been a couple of months.

Recovery continues for me, overall I would say I can handle where I am at. It’s not stopping me from doing most of the things I want but activity does require thought and planning. No get out of jail free reserve energy tank and getting it wrong has consequences. Pushed a bit to hard the other day as HR was at the top end of Z1 for the rest of the day.

Had a major uplift in fitness at the end of May. Have done some large road rides – 75miles being the biggest one. It takes longer to recover but that is probably more a fitness thing. I have now got my full HR range back. Not gasping the top end of Zone 2 anymore or finding the prospect of Zone 4 frightening. O2 levels still randomly move around between 94 – 99 but mostly at 95 – 96. Annoyingly my peak flow is down and staying down.

Oooh, a blast from the past. I’m much better than I was, like OAP still having to allocate energy really carefully, but my RHR has gone back down to something more like its normal high 40s and most of the symptoms have bogged off, though I’m limited rides to less than 90 minutes and at a steady base sort of pace – even so I quite often get a few hours of post-rider elevated HR and fizzy spaciness.

Sometimes progress seems glacial, but but if I look back two or three weeks, I’m definitely on the mend. In very general terms, people with the ‘long tail’ thing often seem to improve after around week 12, which matches my experience of it. Anyway, I ordered a new mountain bike frame to cheer myself up, though it may be a while before it gets ridden with any sort of conviction :-/

I exceeded my limit with a longish ride this week and paid for it the next day with shallow breathing and fatigue. Felt fine while I was out though and on balance it was worth it. I’ll try to stick to sub 2 hour rides. 5 weeks post virus.