This week, my daughter and her teammates are going up to Minnesota for one of the biggest high school meets in the country. It’s affecting both the team’s training and mine.
Of course, it’s affecting theirs more than mine. I’m just along for the ride. However, I think it might be enlightening to see how everyone is affected and how we might be flexible with our training plans in order to account for things like this trip. You might be surprised to see that we’re all being flexible with our training in similar ways.
First, for my daughter’s team. They are shifting their training around a little. They put in a little extra work last week so they could do a little less this week. Keep in mind that, as big and prestigious as this race is, the ultimate goal is the state championship meet in late October. Sacrificing training geared toward that in order to run better at this meet wouldn’t be a smart plan. So they shifted the training a bit. They finished last week pretty fatigued but that allowed them to get some extra recovery this week so they can be at least a little more rested and prepared to run well going into this big meet.
This is the kind of adjustment that is common for high school and collegiate teams. When you have a big mid-season meet, you don’t skip the work that will be crucial for the end of the season but you definitely move things around so you can be a little more rested going into the big meet.
For me, I’m thinking about the travel plans. I’m ramping my training back up this week after a little down time following my last race before season started. However, I know the travel is going to have me not doing much. So, much like the team, I’m shifting my training around a little. I put in more work than I normally would at this point early in the week, knowing that Friday and Saturday especially are going to be days where I won’t get as much in and Sunday will probably be a pretty significant recovery day.
Sadly, for adult runners, we don’t often think about these things. We try to push through or skip out on something if necessary.
Next time you are faced with one of these scheduling dilemmas, consider trying to shuffle the schedule. You don’t want to do things like this all the time but occasionally packing the training in for a bit so you can get some extra recovery can be an adjustment worth making if you have the need.