Losing Fitness Can Be A Scary Thing ...

Many of us talk a good game about taking a "real" off-season. We say we will cut back on mileage. We say we will lose the technology and "just run" or go get in a casual bike ride with friends. And in our minds this is just how it all plays out. Reality, however, just doesn't exactly line up with how the "off-season" has played out to be in our minds.

Casual group rides turn into races. The weeks of short, easy runs get interrupted by a local 5k or two ... or three ... or turn into a short race season. We justify the races as being something that they are not, and (somehow) not detrimental to muscular healing. Because, how much damage could 3 hard miles cause?

I speak from personal experience. In many a year past I have done many stupid things when it came to my training and racing. A number of "off-seasons" ended up being cover for a continuation of my endorphin fix. I would take it easy most of the time. The key word in that last sentence is "most." I won't bore you with all the stupid things I have done, but be sure that I am one of the lucky ones who didn't suffer horrible race seasons filled with injuries as a result of my inability to treat my body right. Over 20 years of endurance sport I have just one serious injury to my name.

But I have learned from my own brand of stupid. The past three months has been a different experience for me than the one just described. Starting on November 2 I have really taken an extended time off from racing and training to rest and strengthen the body. The fitness I had at Ironman Florida is nowhere to be found. Both volume and intensity have been way down. I took a full 30 days off from running. Until the last few weeks I stayed away from hard intervals in the pool and on the run, while seriously limiting the interval work on the bike (mindlessly spinning on a trainer is not an option for me).

This week everything changed. This week, we start the process of getting back into shape. For twelve weeks I have gone from doing virtually zero exercise to exercise to a small bit of training. From a pure volume perspective I am doing roughly 50-60% of what I did during my 2014 peak training weeks. From an intensity perspective, other than the sanity-saving bike intervals mentioned previously, I have done a small handful of running intervals on the treadmill, more for my sanity than anything else.

(***Please take note, when I talk about being "out of shape" I am not talking about becoming a slug on the couch while gaining 30 pounds. In this context, "out of shape" is more like being fit, just not anywhere near your peak condition.)

Losing fitness can be a scary thing. In just the first few days of this week I know I am not where I was just 12 weeks ago. The longest bike ride I have done in 2015 is 80 minutes and a few weeks ago my long run cracked into the double digits. Yesterday I did some long intervals in the pool (4 x 500) that would best be described as survival. In the coming weeks similar sets will feel a bit better every week while slowly getting back to a pace I'm more accustomed to seeing.  I'm not sure I could race an Olympic distance triathlon today, let alone an Ironman.

It takes confidence to lose fitness. I think the reason some of us everyday athletes fear the diminishing of fitness in the off-season is the fear that it will never come back. The thought process, I am guessing, is that fitness can only go up or down, but once it changes direction it will never, ever turn around? Just seeing that written down it doesn't make any sense to me. Hell, even professional athletes are not on the top of their game year round. But they know that getting that fitness back will happen.

Rebuilding fitness is a fun process. Every year I enjoy heading out and feeling my body getting stronger every single week. It is easy to get out there when the gains can actually be seen on the Garmin. And because I generally will stick with a number of my regular run and bike routes, I can see when I am compared to years past. Keeps things fun. Keeps things interesting.

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So here we are in the first week of March and I feel rested both physically and mentally. The next few weeks will be both challenging and fun as I start to will my body back into respectable (for me) shape. On March 14th I'll be doing my first race of the year, the Warm Hearts 5k, more as a test of where my run fitness is than anything else. Next up will be the Emmaus 4 Miler. Triathlon season will kick off at the Jerseyman Triathlon on May 16.

There's a lot of work to get done before my A-race in June. Needless to say, after a necessary, extended break in "real" training, I'm happy to get back at it.

Better weather, more fitness, racing ... can't wait.

Train hard. Stay focused.
Jon