race obsessed
I am not near a downtime in plan nor do I think/ feel I need one yet. However, there are some mornings where I think sleeping in and being lazy for the day 'sure would be nice'.
For me over the past 18 months I have had one period of 'down time'. Due largely from a cancelled goal HM and my mental aspect of WTF over. It did not help that it was cold as fuck and over Christmas, which for me was very easy to slack. Really it was the WTF that got me. Extending a training cycle from 16 weeks to 28 weeks really sucks. Especially having survived the first training go around just to reset and do it again. arrrgghh!
Aside from that that one which lasted about 3 weeks I have had no other down time. (I suspect after October 26th I am due for some rest)
The questions are:
1. What is your downtime schedule per year? 0, 1, 2, 3 times or more?
2. How long does it usually last?
3. What do you due int he downtime? nothing? crosstrain? run however, whatever?
What is a downtime?
I don't really take downtime, just recover from one training cycle and then start another. I do take a week off from everything either once or twice a year. If longer than that, I would do kickboxing or biking, but I have never needed to take longer than that (except post surgery and I biked through it).
Damaris
As part of the 2024 London Marathon, I am fundraising for VICTA, a charity that helps blind and visually impaired children. My mentor while in law school, Jim K (a blind attorney), has been a huge inspiration and an example of courage and perseverance. Please consider donating.
Fundraising Page
Downtime from running? Quite a bit lately. I find that I have other interesting things to do, like canoeing, hiking, etc., along with assorted household clean-up tasks, like completely cleaning out our cellar of 30+ years of accumulated "stuff". And a few home repairs thrown in for good measure. So I'm not sitting around doing nothing at all.
Sometimes it's a lot more fun to do something like this with my wife rather than run ...
Uffda
I have a goal race mid-May, and always go camping with the boys in early June. So I always take a few consecutive days off, no running, no nothing, in early June.
Right now I'm in a forced downtime cycle after the birth of DD#2. It's probably the most legit downtime I've had since I started running. I basically said to myself "Run when I can." I do some plank cross-training daily, just to work on my core. I've been able to maintain about 18 mpw, but that's basically just running twice a week.
I can tell you after three weeks my feet feel the best they've felt all year. This was a problem area for me. After my LR on Sunday my quads are sore, and my calves are sore when I run. Neither of those things used to happen. I'm a little slower too, and I struggle to make it to MP. I assume that with just a few extra weeks back that the speed should return.
- Andrew
I have had a built in break stint on the bench at the conclusion of each of my first three seasons of running so I always enter the year fresh and ready to roll.
What I have come to learn is that by mid-season, I feel mentally drained so I planned a break around my training this year and so far it has worked out nicely.
Whether it helps me attain my goals or not remains to be seen, but it definitely took away the feeling of running being a chore that I usually get around July and August.
I scheduled in 2 weeks off after my last marathon last fall. My break ended up lasting about 2.5 months with some sporadic running here and there, but I was mostly off. I sat on the couch and ate chips and gained close to 20 lbs.
December has been my "mostly easy" month, but with a perhaps overly aggressive no-break transition from spring marathon to PR HM to summer training, my body decided it would force some unplanned downtime.
Last 12 months have been like this:
Injured. Two months without running in June and July 2013. Back at it last August 2013.
9 weeks training for the Chicago marathon in October. No recovery period after. Went back to training immediately.
7 weeks training for the Negril marathon in December. After the race, 3 weeks of recovery: 26 miles, 40 miles and 50 miles.
18 weeks training for the Fredericton marathon in May. No recovery period, went back to training immediately.
5 weeks training for the New Glasgow marathon. DNF, resurgence of my PF at the 18th mile. Took one week completely off, no running. It felt great. I hadn't realized how much I needed this mentally. I hate being told what to do, yet I subject myself to a constant state of training. Go figure...
After the week off, I went back to training for the fall. Now in my 8th week (out of 19).
So out of 52 weeks, I took one week off and three at recovery pace.
Rather than taking whole months of easy running, I prefer skipping a day or two once in a while and adding a few miles on my other runs to maintain my weekly mileage. I don't do well on 7 day a week running.
PRs: Boston Marathon, 3:27, April 15th 2013
Cornwall Half-Marathon, 1:35, April 27th 2013
18 marathons, 18 BQs since 2010
After my goal race in sept, I'll likely extend my season by 6 weeks to target a half in late oct. Then I'll take a week completely off followed by a period of easy running before ramping up again for next year.
I sat on the couch and ate chips and gained close to 20 lbs.
You did that shit like a G yo!
uʍop ǝpᴉsdn sǝʇᴉɹʍ ʇI
Currently, I am on some self-imposed downtime. I am doing it because of niggling injuries and leg fatigue. I am running about 20 mpw and the runs that I do are all easy pace. I was in the third of fourth week of training for a HM on August 23 and one day I just could not run. That's when I figured out I had piriformis issues. I had just gotten rid of PF and Achilles problems and then that showed up. My goal of a 1:32 HM was done and after talking to a few people I knew it was time to take it easy. I am still running the HM but only because DW is running the marathon that day. I had been going hard for almost three years and had done three marathons in seven months and I guess it all caught up to me. Now, the extra rest has been doing me some good. My legs are feeling fresher, running is getting easier, but I am still fighting the pirifomis. Also, with my extra rest time, I have have dedicated myself to doing more core work and that is going well.
Wisdom. ^^