Recovery Weeks.
One time when I trained with Janice, we sat down in a local coffee shop and talked about training cycles and building towards events. Micro cycles and macro cycles and all sorts of things. I mainly nodded and tried to appear as if I understood. It wasn't important that I understood. I was paying her to understand, then tell me what to do and when to do it.
Whatever she did back then, my squiggly lines always were tightly grouped, weaving intricate patterns on their climb to specific targets, backing off, and then working towards some other point.
Since I've been doing my own training thing, my squiggly lines are generally a clusterfuck. This one is too high and that one is too low. I gave up on trying to control them like Janice did, and focused on the one that split the difference. As long as it's going in the general direction I want it to go during a particular time of the season, I'm not going to think about it too much. Sure, I still possess the mental acumen to learn how to control those other two squiggly lines. After all, I just used the word "acumen". The problem is I'm completely out of give a fuck when it comes to the science of human performance. Good or bad, I'd rather just let it be a surprise. It makes the whole thing more of an adventure.
As part of my highly-scientific "how shitty do I feel today?" training plan, I have designated this week as a Recovery Week. All of my workouts will be relatively easier than the weeks preceding it to allow my body to recover and rebuild from the stresses I placed on it. That's how you get stronger- cycles of stress and recovery.
Of course, if one day during this Recovery Week I miraculously feel better I'll just go all-in and drive my fitness even further into the dirt until I can barely turn the cranks for weeks at a time. Then I'll probably get sick, allowing me to get the rest I should have gotten weeks before, which will allow me to start building fitness again.
That's the science of willful ignorance at work, and I expect it to pay big dividends in the spring.
Whatever she did back then, my squiggly lines always were tightly grouped, weaving intricate patterns on their climb to specific targets, backing off, and then working towards some other point.
Since I've been doing my own training thing, my squiggly lines are generally a clusterfuck. This one is too high and that one is too low. I gave up on trying to control them like Janice did, and focused on the one that split the difference. As long as it's going in the general direction I want it to go during a particular time of the season, I'm not going to think about it too much. Sure, I still possess the mental acumen to learn how to control those other two squiggly lines. After all, I just used the word "acumen". The problem is I'm completely out of give a fuck when it comes to the science of human performance. Good or bad, I'd rather just let it be a surprise. It makes the whole thing more of an adventure.
As part of my highly-scientific "how shitty do I feel today?" training plan, I have designated this week as a Recovery Week. All of my workouts will be relatively easier than the weeks preceding it to allow my body to recover and rebuild from the stresses I placed on it. That's how you get stronger- cycles of stress and recovery.
Of course, if one day during this Recovery Week I miraculously feel better I'll just go all-in and drive my fitness even further into the dirt until I can barely turn the cranks for weeks at a time. Then I'll probably get sick, allowing me to get the rest I should have gotten weeks before, which will allow me to start building fitness again.
That's the science of willful ignorance at work, and I expect it to pay big dividends in the spring.
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