OOOF!

Nov. 3, 2010

Training: AM Sub-race pace 15k. Total time: 2hr
              PM Run with strength. Total time: 1 hr

     Well we were able to ski at hillside this morning and to be honest I was quite skeptical of how the conditions would be. I was surprised to find that the skiing was quite good considering the fairly minimal coverage. We hit a few rocks of course, but apart from a few sections, we could ski without trepidation.
      I actually wasn't sure what the workout was going to be today, so I was excited to hear that the workout was to be 3 x double bubble with spencer 5k loop, which is essentially 15k. I have always loved these kinds of workouts. The effort is geared towards capacity building, meaning the pace is to be just below race pace. This is the pace where you are going hard enough to be building lactate (light flooding) in the body, but staying just under the point where your body starts to break down. So its basically going as hard as you can while maintaining comfortable form. The effort is not meant to really stress the body like races can do, but still get that really hard workout feeling afterwards.
     The workout for the most part went well for me. My plan was to ski negative splits on the laps and I accomplished that. The disappointing part in my mind was that my body movements still felt slow. A lot of this has to do with the transition from dryland to snow, but naturally I want my body to do what i want it to now. Having not spend as much time as others on my roller-skis this summer also adds to partial inefficiency in my movements. These will work themselves out with more time on skis, but it still creates frustration.
     These workouts at this time of year are hard on a skier mentally. A skier will tend to gauge his or her own fitness on these workouts with the season only weeks away. The trouble with this is that there is a lot of training buildup in the bodies and some of these workouts might just end up being sub par for what the athlete feels their training should show. This can play with the mental game a lot and I fall into that limbo as well every season. Even though i recognize that my body is just tired, I still try and set goals for myself and when i don't feel they have been met, I get bummed out. Thinking about it now, I realize that I have been training without a recovery week since the week after Trans-Alps. 7 1/2 weeks of solid training without a recovery week. I guess I will wait and see what happens at the end of the week with two sprint TT's coming up and really enjoy the recovery week that follows. That might just be what my body needs at this point. Time to let the great workouts I've put in soak into the body. I love epiphanies!