I had a long bike ride yesterday on a beautiful but windy day and had a big training day today (4hrs of a little bit of everything). I was wiped out by the end of the day. I grabbed a quick snack before bed and headed up a little later than normal which was a no-no. I should of made it a priority to go to bed on time. I tossed around in bed for hours and stared at my clock watching the time tick away. With my early morning swim workout approaching, I managed to log probably a horrible 4 hours of restless sleep.
I woke up and went to swim practice and I was exhausted, unmotivated and lacked FOCUS. It started by losing count on short distance swim sets, then my stroke lost its fluidity. I was wasting so much energy with the poor quality of my swim stroke and was getting very frustrated that I kept losing count or my place in the workout. About halfway through the workout I gave myself a pep talk and got myself out of the bad funk I was in. I now was somewhat working on all cylinders other than my body was fatigued. My form was back and I was back on track with the workout but I felt like I was spending so much of my extra energy on focusing to keep myself in line. I made it through but very frustrated and upset with the overall effort I just put into the workout. Which brings me to question: How important is rest when it relates to focusing? Obviously we know we need to rest to let our bodies recover properly so we can train the following day just as hard but maybe something that is overlooked is the ability to focus completely. When racing or competing, any slip in concentration or focus could be the difference between a PR or a DNF. Focusing is so key in these long endurance races but to stay focused for such long periods of time it is so hard to begin with, so we don't start behind the eight ball before the race even starts. A proper night's sleep is the first key, in my opinion, the day of a race. Don't take a short cut when it is so easy to go to bed at a decent time the night of the race. Now the only problem is trying to fall asleep on pre-race night. In order to perform at a high level make sure you take advantage of every portion of the race as possible. Take care of the easy ones and they will set you up in a better position for the harder ones. SLEEP HARD - STAY FOCUSED
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February 2014
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