Time’s sleight of hand, and poof, the work is behind. Days of intense effort disappearing in the rear view mirror. As stated in earlier posts, the goal of winter training was to log more volume with less running, tune the aerobic engine and rack up vertical gain.
This winter block marks the first time I have logged three consecutive months above 80 training hours. Take a look at the contrast to last year:
Leverage
Now that my kid is in school and I am a paid athlete, I am able to devote more time to the craft. The three years prior, my training input was scrappy, but I am grateful for the adversity.
It lit the machine of purpose and restricted the amount I could train such that my capacity to handle the work grew steadily.
Now that there is room in my life to train 3-4 hours a day most days of the week, I have been able to take advantage of the opportunity, and am grateful for it.
Modes
Running volume accounts for 37% of total training hours, while ski-mo accounted for a nice, fat 43% of the training pie. Overall, I am very happy with this multi-sport balance.
I saw biggest volume in January because snow conditions were good and I did many long days on the skis, logging as much as 5000m (16400ft) of elevation gain in a single session.
If you are familiar with serious ski-mo athletes, you know my numbers are still small in comparison, but a respectable boost from last year.
In addition to longer ski days, I did many doubles this winter. My training plan was not static or repetitive. In fact, I did not schedule a single week. Each day, I based training on sensations and conditions, going by feel and intuition.
I avoided double runs, ensuring all double days were mixed modality. Run-Bike, Strength-Run, Run-Ski. The variations were really fun to play with, each conferring a different type of fatigue. Changing the stimulus has kept training interesting and given me plenty of ideas going forward.
Run Breakdown
In my winter resolutions post, I mentioned that speed was an “expensive adaptation” that I was willing to sacrifice to train other domains. That lasted about a month.
Part of finding a good rhythm with training is to ‘follow your bliss’, and since I was a kid running fast has felt fantastic.
On the other side of the coin are sessions done purely for the training effect, notably treadmill workouts. The idea of going to the gym for a 2 hour treadmill session is pure crazy to most people, but I have made it a staple of my training over the past three years.
During this winter block, 25% of my running hours were done on the treadmill. When using the treamdill, I mostly run on an incline, this lets me get the intensity right and avoid injury. These uphill efforts constitute 40% of the running vertical gain.
Some days, the number is the goal. Hit 2000m d+. Some days it is just a result of accumulating a certain amount of time in a particular zone. 2h in Z2. But yes, I still am a trail runner. 70% of running distance was done on the trails.
One important take away is that despite the substantial cut in running volume, my running form has not declined. I can say with certainty that my running economy (pace at aerobic threshold) is at an all-time high.
On the higher-intensity side, I doubt I have improved, but the body feels primed to break through when I do more specific work.
Setbacks
I got sick twice this winter, missing a total of 6 days of training and negatively impacting another 6 days where I was relegated to a recovery effort.
The first illness came after a peak week, and likely a result of the training stress + exposure to mountain environment mixed with insufficient recovery. The second time was inevitable as the whole family caught the flu.
Getting sick happens to everyone. It’s terribly frustrating when training is going well, but just part of the game.
Energy Budget
The main problem with bounty is indulgence. Now that I have more time to train, there is more risk of over-training (under-recovering). In addition to being a pro-athlete, I have a family and a business. The result is a very high daily energy expenditure.
Work output can only be as high as the energy reserve. Despite knowing the consequences, I still train on empty.
This remains the biggest optimization left to deploy. But it’s hard, undermines my inner-voice that says, Fuck you weakness. The reality is better performance means better balance between training and recovery.
That does not necessarily require doing less volume, but being smarter about when to do a lot and making peace with doing nothing.
What’s next
I plan on taking advantage of the snow so long as I can, but as the first race of the season approaches (MIUT April 27), will run more and try to ready myself for the specific demands of that race (to be detailed down the line).
Sometimes just getting a training session done is a big win. Logging a solid week, still more satisfying. Then you have months choked with toil and its kind of amazing. Got to love the process.