(picture taken from fundraising cycling event: Ride 2 Recovery)
SEE BELOW FOR A SUGGESTION FOR YOUR NEXT EVENT!
Chris Carmichael (Carmichael Training Systems), ex-cycling coach for such cyclists as Lance Armstrong and George Hincapie, plus many other types of athletes, has a newsletter that he sends out on a weekly basis. This is one that I received this morning and I couldn't agree more with it!
This email was all about why we want to do special events such as 5ks, 10ks, half-marathons, marathons, centuries, double centuries, etc...
Should we do them once in a lifetime, sort of like a "bucket list" event? Once a year? Once a month?
His answer is.... just about every 3-4 months! But why?
This is what Chris Carmichael has to say:
1. Time to recover
Following a big goal event, everyone wants a little time to decompress and relax. It’s good for the body and the mind. With a 3-4 month gap between goal events, there’s enough time to take a week or two of recovery time and light activity before getting back into the swing of productive training. As an added bonus, during this period you’re adapting and gaining fitness due to the training stimulus from your recent event. Remember, a big event is also a big training stimulus!
2. Time to train
When athletes cluster their goal events into a short period within the year, it can be difficult to have enough time to both recover and train between events. That leads to a ‘race-and-recover’ period where there isn't enough time to really focus on productive training in between competitions. It's not bad for competitions to also provide a training stimulus (see Reason Number 1), but it's also important to have the time to incorporate that stimulus into a more comprehensive plan. With a goal event every 3-4 months and perhaps smaller events in between for fun and skills work, you have enough time to focus on effective training blocks between meaningful competitions.
3. Time to stay motivated
When I got home from the USA Pro Challenge on August 25 I was happy, content, and exhausted. Within a few weeks I had done my recovery time, gotten back into some structured training, and my next adventure was about two months away. With La Ruta on the horizon it was easy to stay motivated to train, but when the interval between goal events is too long athletes find it easier for their focus to wander.
He goes on to say (and I am slightly paraphrasing) that by spacing goal events out every 3-4 months, you never give yourself too much time to lose too much fitness, which means you never have that feeling you’re ‘starting over’ when you finally identify another goal to train for. You know that, even though fitness fluctuates up and down, when it comes to performance you’ll always be in physically prepared, you will never be out of shape, and at any time you can go from good to great within about 8 weeks!
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SAVE THE DATE: 4.27.14
SAVE THE DATE: 4.27.14
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FOR THE LONG BEACH TOUR de CURE!
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