First Failure, Then Progress

I didn't write a blog post last week. At first it was because I was busy. But that was only the first two days of the week. The plan was to write a post on Wednesday because I had two workouts scheduled and figured out of the two of them I'd have something interesting to write about. And I did. I just didn't write anything because by Wednesday evening, I was pissed off.

Last week's bike ride went fine. In fact I'd say I was really happy about it because I could feel a bit of speed creeping into my legs even though I'm still riding very easily. The ride was around 2 hours and when I was done I didn't feel as though I'd ridden at all. That was in the morning, which even though I got a bit of a late start was still relatively cool temperature wise. In retrospect my late start on the bike would be the beginning of my undoing training wise for the day.

It just so happened, that I was out of some of my key food items that day and really needed to go to the store. Because of this I didn't eat properly before my ride and after my ride (which started and ended late) I had to go shop for things to eat. The only stores that carry some of the things I use, were across town.

By the time I shopped, ate and took a very short nap, it was time for my track MAF workout in the afternoon. When I got to the track this is where things just went completely south. My heart rate, while still aerobic, was nowhere near my MAF zone even walking. I was so frustrated, I wound up bagging the MAF test and running a single 600m interval in 1:53 with a max HR of 186, then thinking better of it ran stairs, stopping and walking when my HR crested 153. Needless to say it was frustrating because every week prior to this I had seen improvement in my speed at MAF and now I was basically reduced to walking.

I think this is why so many athletes avoid this type of training or don't stick with it very long if they do try it. It is humiliating to run so slow, then find out it isn't slow "enough."

So I left the track pretty upset even though the 600 meter split was nothing to sneeze about, I was comfortable throughout the 400m and accelerated through the line during the entire last 200m. I could have gone much faster. But that has never been my problem. So I wasn't thinking about that. I was thinking about the MAF test I flunked. And I was pissed off so, no blog posts until I calmed down.

It was Sunday when I decided I needed to do some things differently. For starters get all my food ready so I didn't need to shop. Then get to bed so I could get up early enough for my morning ride and get back in time to eat and nap. Then go to the track. This week was a complete reversal from the week before. I dropped 10 seconds per mile from my last MAF and 1bpm in average heart rate.

Needless to say I'm happy again, and blogging can continue.