Ease Back In

It never fails that the early winter months training for me seems to be prime and then vacation comes. Following vacation it never fails that work picks up requiring more hours, lawn and home care seems to increase and a variety of other activities pick up as well. Another challenge is how heat impacts performance during training.

In the past years I would get discouraged with a drop in fitness that comes from all of this in late spring, but this year I had mentally prepared for it. I was determined this year that instead of pushing too hard trying to regain that sudden loss of fitness that I would ease back into training. Since I do not race and this year I am not even looking to do any events at all there was no need to push too hard. Besides fitness adaptations come at their own pace and when we try to push too hard the only thing that can happen is fatigue, frustration and discomfort from sore muscles and joints.

The image below is a reflection of gradually picking up intensity and training duration since our vacation in early May. If all goes well all of those indoor roller sessions will be back up to solid 60 minute training sessions not including warm up and cool down periods. The caveat is "if all goes well." My work load is still heavy, the yard still needs mowing each week, activities are still popping up (like family gatherings). The biggest challenge is dealing with heat while training indoors and trying to keep the core temperature low enough to get to the appropriate intensity levels. I use a pretty good fan, but still get overheated.

As my CTL (reflection of fitness level) increases a little each week how I feel out on the road is improving as well. I am currently back up to a 70 CTL, but was feeling really good performance wise when I was at 88 CTL before the vacation. Oh well I should be back in good shape by late summer and going into the fall months.

(click image to enlarge)