Recovery and Restart

My last post was on the last day of 2010 - and practically the following day my laptop went kaput, donezo, blank, byebye. After a recovery stint in the hands of the Geek Squad (seriously, could their name be any dorkier) I have my trusty laptop back. And what's even better is that to my surprise, nothing was lost! Geek Squad informed me they had to replace the hard drive (bye bye data) and following the restart the screen was BLANK. The laptop took a little trip somewhere unknown....and they had to replace the motherboard. The only thing I know about the motherboard is that it's important (what mothers, aren't?) and that Carrie lost her computer to a motherboard problem as well (and she had a MAC....anyway). Turns out that ONLY them motherboard had to be replaced and NOT the hard drive. Imagine my surprise when a family picture was in front of me (my desktop background) when I booted on. My first check at reality. My second check was the icon of all icons...the one I griped about a few days ago following an 11 mile treadmill run, all my Garmin workout data from 2010 would be gone, byebye. NOT SO MUCH! Yay!! So, my laptop had a bit of a recovery period for about 25 days and now he is back and better than ever it seems :) It's a restart :)

It's now January 26th and I still don't have a 2011 race plan solidified. Argh. I'm training and preparing and reading and well, I need to get it planned out.

I started using a new planner for my workouts. I have tried several different notebooks, journals, spreadsheets, etc to log my workouts in the past, but thought what the heck, how about start a brand new one on January 1st (Jan 3 technically, as Jan 3 was a Monday). So I have been using that fairly successfully. My primary goal for LAST week was a minimum of 10 hours of training. I reached that weekly goal with the help of the 1:45 run on the treadmill at Gold's (thank you, tv)mon Saturday followed by a 1:45 spin ride and about 30 walking and backwards lunges on Sunday. Yowza. I was done. Not good. Mentally this workout was ridiculous. I could have given up at almost ANY point, but I didn't (maybe should have lol), but for battling through the mental part, I have never been prouder of myself.

I was ramping my training up and have normally been recovering appropriately. That weekend may have put me over the edge. Not good. Sunday I was exhausted-combined with football game eating, and drinking, and it was a bad bad combo. Monday morning came and went - no workout - the afternoon came and went - legs are sore, especially my left one - no workout. Stupid lunges. I cursed myself for my inadequate nutrition over the weekend and cursed myself for doing the damn lunges. I need to move on from this. I need to restart.

The normal pattern of a training plan that I follow is a 3 week build followed by a 1 week recovery. Physically, this works very very well and is well-supported in the literature. Mentally, this is normally ok for my brain. Well....if I continue on the training plan for IMSG this week is a recovery week. I can't seem to get this into my head. I want to crash and burn so badly. Mentally, I do! Physically, my body is saying NO. I won't even go into the fact that I went BACK to bed following spin class this morning.....So, Monday was a no-workout day. Fine. I needed it. Move on, Erin. Yesterday I wanted to run and bike and swim. I ran 45 easy on the treadmill (don't even get me started on the cold spell we had while the laptop was in recovery mode) ending the run with about ten 15-second pickups at 6%. This felt good! Yay! I finished with some body weight strength exercises I found in a new book I am reading. Fine, Tuesday was done. Nearly every hour I have to tell myself, it's okay, Erin, you are supposed to be recovering. Not that I need the mental reminder, as if my quads aren't reminding me enough as it is. And I had to work til 10pm....Restart on Wednesday, right?! Wednesday rolls around and I am signed up for spin class - remember normally Wednesday is my crash and burn day. I have started to REALLY be pumped for these days. I wanted to run off the bike so bad today, but I told myself NO, this is a recovery day. I could just cry. This is so silly too. The spin class was high intensity (and yes, my legs are still recovering from the weekend, still, still.) which is what I want to do during a recovery week. Low volume, high intensity. I wanted to swim today as well, but again, told myself NO.

My plan for the rest of the week is to continue to NOT overdo my workouts. I promised myself that if I behave this week next week will be even better.

Optimal Stress + Optimal Rest = Optimal Progress

I need to really focus on this. Overall, my training is at a point much higher than it was this same time last year and for that I am pleased with myself. However, if I increase the stress I place on my body without increasing the rest in a proportional manner it's not a matter of IF I will get injured it is a matter of WHEN I will get injured. As I explained my case above... Too much stress + inadequate recovery = greater time recovery needed = boo

Every day is a new day - and chance to restart. I need to recover and I need to restart. My laptop did it. So can I.

Stay tuned...