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September
10
The other night I was talking with two members of the National Biathlon
team. They were saying how they are just finishing up a "month off"
and were about to reconvene in Park City/Soldier Hollow for more
team training. Back in June-July they spent three weeks living in
isolation on Daniel's Summit outside Heber, Utah. They were living/eating/sleeping
up there at 10,000 feet. Then they would travel down to Soldier
Hollow (elevation 5500 feet) to train each day. This is your old
fashion altitude training (old fashioned meaning not involving Nitrogen
Houses, EPO, or anything of the like). After the altitude camp and
another month of team training, they had their month off in August,
now they are reconvening for some more team training before heading
back up to Daniel's Summit for a few more weeks before the ski season
begins.
Anyway, during the course
of our discussion about their dryland plan, I asked about the month
off: "So by 'Off' you mean that you are on you own for training
and not obligated to workout with the team, right?" The response
I got to this question was, "No, we don't have to train at all during
that time if we don't want to." Almost a vacation. Now, to be fair,
it still sounded like most of them kept active, but it was mellow,
easy training. This struck me as very odd. Lose a whole month of
valuable dryland training? How could they do that?
Then the next night I was
talking on the phone with Torbjorn. He told me how he had suggested
to Justin Wadsworth that Justin take two days off this week and
he thought I should do the same. I said that I was feeling pretty
good and didn't feel I needed more than one rest day, especially
since this is supposed to be an easy week for me anyway. Torbjorn's
response was that was exactly why I should take more time off. He
recommended the extra day off to Justin because Justin was feeling
great. Confused? Well, as Torbjorn explained, when athletes start
to feel really good, they tend to do even more and more training,
pushing harder and harder, until they finally run themselves into
the ground. His theory is that it is better to back off a little
too early than too late, especially at altitude where your body
takes longer to recover. Justin and I are both coming off 2-3 weeks
of good hard training and will have another 2 intense weeks during
the US Ski Team camp that starts next week. So we should rest now
in order to keep the good vibes going the next few weeks.
This made sense to me. As
I ran this morning, I started to put what the biathletes had said
together with what Torbjorn had said and I came up with an idea.
I decided that I would make this week EXTREMELY easy. I have just
finished up what is probably my best summer of training ever and
I am about to start the final 6-week training push towards the ski
season. It makes sense to reload now, so I am firing on all cylinders
during this next period. A little extra rest can't hurt, but too
little rest could be disastrous. Now I won't exactly be taking a
month off, but this week I plan on doing only about 6-8 hours of
training ( a normal "Easy/Recovery Week" for me is about 12 hours).
I'll still do some intervals and weights and a little distance,
but it will be low key and fewer hours. It will allow me to refresh
both mentally and physically and get ready to rock the next month
and a half.
So if you need me, I'll be
sunning myself by the pool. Aw, who am I kidding - I'll be spending
the extra time at work.
September
27
It seems like every September, the US Ski Team has on the schedule
a training camp in Park City. And every year I think it will be
a great training opportunity. And it never materializes. Some of
the athletes don't show up. Some of them have their own programs
and train on their own. And when the team only has five members,
it means that the training camp never really happens. The same thing
happened this year. Even though most of the team was in town, it
seemed like each was doing his own thing. This was in sharp contrast
to the Canadian women's team who has also been here for their own
camp, and have been much more cohesive in their training efforts.
On a side note, the Canadian women, as a team, have also been much
more successful than any of the US teams recently. Hmmmm. Anyway,
the collapse of the US camp did have a side benefit to me. Since
Justin Wadsworth is also coached by Torbjorn, I got to do many of
my workouts with him. It has been a great experience to chase Justin
around Soldier Hollow during interval sessions and time trials.
I learned a lot from watching how he pushed himself in intervals
and Torbjorn was able to point out some helpful differences in our
techniques. For the past three weeks all my hard workouts have been
with Justin and today was the last one before he left town - a 10K
classic rollerski time trial. The goal was to start fast, but kind
of easy (level III) and then pick it up to race pace after about
3K. You will be able to read the results soon in the IRS section,
but suffice it to say that I didn't win but I had a good race. It
has been a good couple weeks training with Justin and around so
many other good athletes. I feel good and I am encouraged by what
I have seen from myself and others over the past few weeks. For
the first time in months, maybe years, I can feel my body getting
stronger with every workout. I feel like I can push myself and instead
of getting worn down, I am being built up. This is just the time
of year I want to feel this, and I am psyched about it. Now just
a couple more solid weeks of training and I'll be off to the races.
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