Very Likely A Bad Idea.
The other day I had to cut a workout planned for an hour to 35 minutes because of time constraints. This trend has to stop, so I got on the bike after work to make up the time and put a little more in the bank in case it happened again.
The 35 minute workout had gone well enough, as I was already rattled by the clock, so I poured everything I had into the time I had. Even if I hadn't gotten back on in the afternoon, the Intensity Factor and Training Stress Score were high enough that my Chronic Training Load wouldn't have been affected. That's a fancy-pants way of saying I hammered the piss out of it. Still, I was 25 minutes short, and my obsessive compulsive side just wouldn't let that stand.
My workout after work was delayed a bit. My wife had class, so dinner was early. A heavy meal of pot roast and potatoes isn't exactly what you want in the gut before a workout, but I figured I'd just ride easy-ish for a while and then call it quits. Any moderate effort was going to push the squiggly line upwards, so there was no need to hammer again.
Yeah... about that. I don't know why, but the legs were primed to go and unwilling to slow down. I started chugging away on the first lap, hoping that they would calm down. Instead, I got a 30 Day PR for the loop. I kept going. When I looped back to the sprint, I thought one solid effort would kill me. Nope, another 30 Day PR. The legs only went harder, and my brain was just along for the ride. It was one of those magical days where everything falls in line. No matter how hard I plan and scheme, those days never seem to happen when it matters, but at my age I'm glad that they still happen at all.
I knew I was going to pay for it the next day, and I was right. While the numbers I put up weren't horrible (by my standards), I could tell my legs were dead. While they could sustain a decent wattage, changing that power was a slow process involving a lot of whining and bargaining. Sprinting just wasn't in the cards.
Eventually, when I was putting out more sweat than power, I pulled the plug. Another workout cut short. Fortunately I had more than enough time banked from the previous night, so I didn't feel too guilty about it. In my mind, cutting it short for time is different from cutting it short because of fatigue. At a certain point, you are doing more harm than good.
Yeah, I overdid it. I like to do that once in a while to shock the system a bit, to force it to adapt to increased strain. It gets too comfortable sometimes. I'm not sure if this a valid training philosophy or just a really bad idea, but my whole training plan is based on unsupported assumptions and wild guesses, so it fits right in.
I just realized- my training plan is the exercise equivalent of the Trump White House. Hmmm... I might want to re-think my approach.
The 35 minute workout had gone well enough, as I was already rattled by the clock, so I poured everything I had into the time I had. Even if I hadn't gotten back on in the afternoon, the Intensity Factor and Training Stress Score were high enough that my Chronic Training Load wouldn't have been affected. That's a fancy-pants way of saying I hammered the piss out of it. Still, I was 25 minutes short, and my obsessive compulsive side just wouldn't let that stand.
My workout after work was delayed a bit. My wife had class, so dinner was early. A heavy meal of pot roast and potatoes isn't exactly what you want in the gut before a workout, but I figured I'd just ride easy-ish for a while and then call it quits. Any moderate effort was going to push the squiggly line upwards, so there was no need to hammer again.
Yeah... about that. I don't know why, but the legs were primed to go and unwilling to slow down. I started chugging away on the first lap, hoping that they would calm down. Instead, I got a 30 Day PR for the loop. I kept going. When I looped back to the sprint, I thought one solid effort would kill me. Nope, another 30 Day PR. The legs only went harder, and my brain was just along for the ride. It was one of those magical days where everything falls in line. No matter how hard I plan and scheme, those days never seem to happen when it matters, but at my age I'm glad that they still happen at all.
I knew I was going to pay for it the next day, and I was right. While the numbers I put up weren't horrible (by my standards), I could tell my legs were dead. While they could sustain a decent wattage, changing that power was a slow process involving a lot of whining and bargaining. Sprinting just wasn't in the cards.
Eventually, when I was putting out more sweat than power, I pulled the plug. Another workout cut short. Fortunately I had more than enough time banked from the previous night, so I didn't feel too guilty about it. In my mind, cutting it short for time is different from cutting it short because of fatigue. At a certain point, you are doing more harm than good.
Yeah, I overdid it. I like to do that once in a while to shock the system a bit, to force it to adapt to increased strain. It gets too comfortable sometimes. I'm not sure if this a valid training philosophy or just a really bad idea, but my whole training plan is based on unsupported assumptions and wild guesses, so it fits right in.
I just realized- my training plan is the exercise equivalent of the Trump White House. Hmmm... I might want to re-think my approach.
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