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Friday, July 8, 2011

Training, Resting and Vacation

I'm leaving for a week at the beach on Sunday and I cannot wait!  I'm looking forward to a lot of relaxing, reading, sun and fresh air.  I tend to fully embrace the potential for extra rest and recovery.  I'm not going to bring my bike with me, but I do plan on a few runs and plenty of "swimming" in the ocean.  I may even attempt an actual ocean swim, we'll see.

As I mentioned last week I have been feeling a bit burned out, so I decided to try to add an extra rest day to each week in July.  I may end up taking an more extended break next week while I'm on vacation, but this week I decided to just go with two full rest days instead of my normal one.  Mentally I like the idea of spacing out my rest over the month, rather than taking a couple of days now and jumping back into my "regular" schedule.

I also decided to make more of an effort to do what I really felt like doing, rather than making sure I got in x number of runs, rides and swims in a given week.  What I discovered is that I am mainly lacking motivation when it comes to biking.  I've had a couple of good runs and swims this week and I was looking forward to all of them when I got started.  I suppose this bodes well for marathon training (which starts in August) since I've really been feeling like I would like to run more.  Hopefully that lasts for the next few months!  I'm not exactly sure where it leaves me with the bike though.  Today was actually my first day on my bike in a week.  I had a great workout once I got started but it definitely takes a little extra effort to get myself up and riding in the morning.  I'll be taking next week off (unless we rent bikes and go for a casual ride).  Then once I get back from the beach I only have two more weeks until my tri.  I'll make an effort to ride a few times before the race, but after that I'm not sure exactly what will happen.  If I really think about it, I suppose it doesn't really matter.  I have no obligation to anyone (even myself) to keep up a certain level of riding.  I imagine that once marathon training picks up, my bike is going to start gathering dust, at least for a few months.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

A few weeks ago, I experienced EXACTLY what you are going through! I changed my training plan to be "I do what I want, when I want, how I want" and I am doing great! I even took about 1.5 weeks off the bike (mainly because of injury), but when I got back on was faster and stronger and more motivated than before!

REST IS GOOD!

Elizabeth said...

Sounds like a good strategy to add more rest days in overall instead of lumping them together. Enjoy the beach!

Liz said...

A week off is a great way to get your mojo back! Have an awesome time at the beach!

Victoria said...

Quality bike this morning calls for extended rest. Enjoy the beach!

Anonymous said...

Enjoy your week off and the relaxation!

Anonymous said...

Oh enjoy your week off! I'm counting down to my vacation in August, and cannot wait! The beach is calling my name!

Erin @ UntilYouTri said...

Aw, good for you for adding more rest days! For my first tri my training plan (from Team in Training) had me doing two sports a day, six days a week. I was SO burned out after a few months of that. For my next try I decided to do mostly one sport a day, with a brick on the weekend, and only 5 days a week (with one day sometimes rest sometimes cross training). It was SO much better, and I still PRed. I think everyone's bodies are different, and for me, I just do better with more rest days. i also focused on making the workout days QUALITY workouts (instead of just going out and running 5 miles at a steady pace, doing a tempo workout or something like that). Glad you can get some rest and vacation in!!

Katie said...

have fuuuuuuuuun!