My original plan was to avoid the van transfer to Nuremberg and ride (100 km).
Given it was 70F at dawn, with forecast high of 95F, I was pleased with my decision to do a flat loop before breakfast, then tag along with Dave in the luggage van.
This morning’s ride had an Over/Under main set.
Three intervals of 20 minutes duration.
Each interval alternates 2 minutes over Ironman Effort with 3 minutes under Ironman Effort.
Yesterday, I was chatting with Johan (Swedish coach of the year, multiple Olympian, coach to World Record Holder Nils van der Poel). Johan can see my TrainingPeaks and the plan didn’t say over/under “what.” When Johan saw the workout he was like…
Woah… an hour of over/unders is a bold session for race week…
I laughed and explained that over/under means something quite different in the ultra endurance world than the skating world.
The main set went great. I averaged 245w with an average heart rate of 114/118/122 bpm by interval.
The Hard Part
Getting tired is the easy part.
When you find yourself with an urge to smash yourself, it can be a sign you are stressed. The stress hormones released after intensity feel relaxing. Your drive to train hard may be a compulsion to feel the release afterwards.
While performance can result, it is not the core motivation. The core motivation is release. Release from what? That’s for you to find out. That’s your hard part, not the training.
Or you might be someone with poor impulse control, who goes bananas as soon as the sympathetic nervous system is activated and heart rate rises.
This profile can track back to a sensitive kid who was subject to abuse/bullying. Your hard part is gaining control of your fight-or-flight system so you have the capacity to choose, change and sustain effort.
You often feel like you are on autopilot when triggered. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Start small, gain control in sport, build outwards.
Both of the athlete types (above) will struggle with consistency and be prone to chronic injury and niggles. This will be easiest to see with their running.
The need to chronically elevate the nervous system will result in dramatic mood swings (especially internally).
The need for emotional release/control will increase the risk of disordered eating and mental health challenges.
It’s worth getting to know yourself.
The hard part for the guy in the middle isn’t his tough sessions. It’s the thousands of hours required. This is where most amateurs should focus.
Repeat The Week
While you are repeating the week, remove whatever causes you to miss sessions:
Lack of sleep.
Races beyond your current capacity.
Every session that exhausts you.
Emotional triggers.
Years and years of removal.
Removal is hard.
Removal can be a poor choice.
Removing the love of my life and my young family would have been nuts (though I see it happen). My hard part was letting go of competitive sport to focus on my marriage and teaching my kids.
When you’re in it.
Gripping tightly to the hope that improved athletic performance will deliver you from a life that’s making you stressed, miserable and sick…
…it can be impossible to see the better life that’s outside the compulsion to train.
If you are in it then your hard part is leaving competition, getting healthy and building a wonderful life.
The courage to change.
If getting the work done is a strength then the hard part might be coming up with an adaptation strategy to get the benefit from your work.
The list below is from Hallmarks of Effective Loading. Take it and make it your own.
My Recovery Rules
Two back-to-back easy day every week.
Two back-to-back days off running every week.
Half my days are easy.
Unload running every third week.
Deep unload once a year (four weeks).
Shallow unload whenever I suspect I’ve gone stale (two weeks).
The things that scare us are gateways to a better way of living.
Getting tired is the easy part.
that was a great article gordo, you just nail it every time, its like you are writing it directly to me . Wishing you everything you have worked for at Roth
Nenet
Hits home! ;-) Go kill it this week Bro, or at least the last 90 minutes!! ;-)