Getting Back in the Groove

It turns out that when you're already busy, finding time to keep up a blog is difficult.  Oh well, as with everything else, I'll do what I can!  It's 4th of July week and I'm taking tomorrow off.  It's otherwise been incredibly busy at work and at home.  My home projects are getting a bit overwhelming, but training continues!

So I'm getting back in the training groove.  That means finding a good rhythm and routine for workouts, but it also means constant fatigue and soreness.  Those last two are welcome friends that are harbingers of long term success of handled well.  They can also cause you to crash and burn if not handled well.  By this point I know my body well enough to listen to it when necessary, but this is also an area where I trust my coach, Jorge, to keep me just under that threshold of overdoing it. 

Early on with Jorge, he gave me some great advice.  He said that even when you're not feeling up for a workout, at least try to get out and do the warm up and that if you're still not feeling great by the end of the warm up then pack it in and call it a day.  As he said would be the case, some of my best workouts have come on those days when I thought I was too tired to work out.  Unfortunately, there have been plenty of days that I've not been mentally able to get geared up for a workout and have packed it in.  A lot of the times it's the mental fatigue, not the physical, that gets in the way. 

With that in mind, yesterday was probably close to my worst day of the year both mentally and physically.  I was tired and struggled through work.  I cut my swim short and ended up losing discipline and 'oversnacking' a little bit.  I knew I was finally feeling the effects of several weeks of steady training, which hasn't happened much this year. 

Then, today, I felt better on my workouts than I have any other day of the year.  Oh, my legs still felt a tad sluggish and I would have loved to just relax a bit.  This morning was an easy 40 minute run, which felt easier than any run I've done all year.  I had to hold back from pushing the pace.  My 6x4min @105% CP workout this evening was a slow warmup, but I absolutely nailed the main set.  I closed it out with a shoulder rehab session.  Days like these are real confidence builders, and it was preceded by one of my worst days of the year. 

6x4 Workout (292W, 297W, 297W, 300W, 303W, 306W)

So I'm feeling good.  I did my power tests over the past two weeks and set a PR of 354W for my 5MP and stayed the same for my 20MP with a 295W.  It's not great, but I haven't done the training to expect differently.  I've got my run CV testing coming in the next two weeks, which is terrifying.  I'm not sure which is worse, the 20MP test or the 2 mile run test.  Either way, no fun!