In Thoughts on Training #5 I looked at motivation and how it ebbs and flows for everyone. Some days you’re motivated to train and some days you aren’t. It’s those low motivation days that often need addressing. External motivators, like bringing on a coach or a training partner, almost always get you out the door.
Of course, an occasional low motivation day could also be your body trying to tell you something. Maybe it needs some rest and can’t get your attention any other way. If that’s the case, and it quite often is, you may need a day off or perhaps an extended rest and recovery break of a few days. But for now, let’s look at a key internal motivator—how having a training plan can boost motivation and help you avoid inconsistent training.
Planning and Preparation
Planning is at the core of training and racing, and it starts with deciding where you want to go. Then comes preparation. Preparing for a race is much like going on a long drive to a distant city. If you’ve never been there before, you need to take the time to carefully plan your route. If you’ve been there many times before, the planning is easy—just repeat the route much the same as you’ve done on previous trips. It can all be in your head—no need for a written description or GPS.
Regardless of your previous trips to this destination, you’ll need to be prepared for changes. You’re certain to run into detours along the way, which could mean significantly changing the route you had originally planned to take. You’ll need to be prepared for such roadblocks in your training just as you would on a long drive. In fact, you should expect them. I’ve never taken a single athlete through an entire season without making changes to their plan, sometimes quite extreme changes. My Training Bible books address this matter in great detail. These books may serve as your guide for how to get to where you want to go in sport.
Creating a Race Plan, Step By Step
Even though I’ve written entire books on the topic, creating a plan doesn’t have to be a cumbersome task. Let’s keep this simple. There are four basic steps in putting a race plan together…
Step 1. What is your event-related goal? Where exactly do you want to go: podium, personal best, top 10, finish, or something else? This may take some deep thinking. Keep it realistic. Don’t aim for the stars if your goal is really to make it to the moon. Unrealistic goals are de-motivating.
Step 2. Lay out a general overview for the weeks leading up to your goal. Decide what is standing in the way of achieving that goal. This is critical. What are the most important things you need to accomplish in training along the way (see Thoughts on Training #2 about “limiters”)?
Step 3. Create a weekly, easily repeatable schedule of workouts you’ll do on different days for the buildup to your race. Here I’d strongly suggest using my 5-2 training routine to simplify things and not overdo your training to the point of injury, illness, burnout, or overtraining. It’s simple. Five days in your basic week are easy. They’re either low intensity (zones 1 and 2) or a day off. These will stay much the same throughout the season. The remaining two days each week are your hard days. They are either zone 4 or zone 5 (and any long workouts that feel hard to you near the end, although they’re done at a low intensity). The hard days are separated by two or three easy days.
Step 4. Decide how the easy and hard training days will progress building up to your event. Gradually increase volume by doing longer easy sessions in the 8- to 12-week base period along with some zone 3 and 4 workouts on hard days. The next 8 weeks make up the build period when the two hard days focus on specific aspects of your event—combined duration and intensity. Then finish the specific preparation with about two weeks of peaking by gradually cutting back on duration while you closely mimic the anticipated event intensity with short intervals.
That’s pretty much my Training Bible books in a nutshell.
It may take you a half hour to put this plan together: goal, limiters, weekly schedule, and workouts for next week. It will pay off by keeping you on track for your race.
Recording and Reflecting
Putting all of this on a paper or virtual calendar, or on your TrainingPeaks calendar, will give your season a focus. As things change in your life, as they most certainly will, come back to your plan and make adjustments. On the day before a workout check to see what the plan calendar calls for and confirm that it is still on track, or make a change if you need to. Then check off the days on the calendar as you complete the workouts. It’s also a good idea to briefly include how you felt after each workout. Include any other data you want, but always remember that your workout perception is the most important data point. Keep it brief and easy to check at a glance. A 1-5 scale or an A-B-C-D-F grade as you did in school keeps it simple.
Having such a plan makes for a valuable internal motivator.
For my last post in this series, I’ll share my thoughts on the little things that can get in the way of training.
You must be logged in to post a comment.