Friday, April 13, 2012

Perplexing Things

©All rights reserved by Phil Mcgrew

Here are some things that perplex me, or make me go "Hmmmmm...":

I spend an entire day hiking up and down a mountain, get about 3 hours of recovery, and I have my best speed workout of the season. My legs felt absolutely thrashed as I walked to the workout, but once I started running, my turnover was quick, and I immediately was holding 6:30+ pace. The only way I could describe it is that they felt warmed up from the get-go. The first interval, I felt my legs buckle underneath me a couple of times, but once I got going, I was going fast, I mean 5:45 pace for 3-minute fartleks. In fact, this is not an uncommon occurrence. Often, I have my best runs right after a full day of work, which includes standing on the pool deck for 3 hours. And all too often, I've noticed some damn good races when my legs are feeling a bit fatigued, or when I've had a hard workout, two days prior. I've had a prominent coach tell me that you need to shock the body 1-3 days out of race day so I'm thinking this may be the principal behind this.

I woke up to some major bad attitude this morning, like "I don't want to get out of bed" and "why do I do this" type of bad attitude, and then proceed to push myself mentally and physically to one of my best runs of the season. Is having a bad attitude not as bad as we think?

The more fit I get, the worst the first 30 minutes of every workout feels.

I'm pretty disciplined around food, especially not eating too much sugar or sweets. But in a 24-hour period, I consume a banana split, some almond-filled, berry goodness pastry, and two bowls of strawberry bread pudding. I totally needed it, and actually, I wanted more.

When it rains, it pours. Figuratively, for some reason, I've had lots of random acts of kindness laid upon me this past week, including this sweet kit from Clif Bar. And Literally, it's been pouring rain here, including a major thunderstorm last night, my favorite type of weather.

6 comments:

Beth said...

Do I see a connection between the good workouts and the banana split/pastry/bread pudding??? At least that's the connection I would like to make!! :)

I also have the thing where I feel worse the first 30 minutes of every workout as I get fit. Less fresh but more fit right?! :)

Have a great weekend Kiet!

Steve said...

want to know one of the things that made me scratch my head??? Nutrition in a half. What do you need a GU?? 2??? You said you nailed the nutrition and still cramped... That seemed weird to me.

No words of wisdom, but watching from the sidelines as a fan. :)

xo

JC said...

I can't believe you ate all of that! I'm with Beth - if there is some connection I'm leaving this eating good crap and hooking myself up with some BANANASPLITS! Yum! Happy Weekend Dude!

Libby said...

whoa I love the food pics. yumm!!
totally agreed, the more rested I am, the worse I do in a race for sure! I used to have my best swim workouts in high school when I was so hung over that the entire pool was spinning lol... I had a bad kid phase :) BUT I learned that early on sometimes the best training days come when you least expect it! glad you are feeling so awesome! I agree with beth, yummy food= improved performance

Kim said...

Humm... that is somewhat of a mystery but I also believe that our bodies are so much more responsive than we give them credit for sometimes. I don't think recovery has to look the same for everyone. My massage guy ran his best races after a full night shift at a machine shop. He said he felt more "warmed up". Sometimes you need sweets.. I'm sorry, but I do sometimes. Lastly, I wish we lived closer so we could run around all short and speedy together.

IAN said...

I learned a while ago that I need to stop going into workouts with any expectation. The mind is a powerful thing, and sometimes even if the body is willing, preconceived negativity toward the workout can overpower the body's willingness.

I would also agree with the "shock the body" a few days out from a race. Well, to some extent at least. Possibly chalk it up to semantics, but "shock" seems too strong. I would say you need to "jolt" the body. Intensity during taper... muy importante.