Race Week - Day 2

Day 2 of race week and things are probably starting to get a bit more real.

The message today relates to one of the messages I put up in the post yesterday, the one about sticking to your program and tapering correctly.

Having a good taper can make or break race day, particularly for longer events. Tapering right can mean you hit the start line sufficiently rested and raring to go. Tapering incorrectly can mean you hit the start line either feeling a bit slow and flat, or you might hit the wall half way through the bike.

Tapering right means doing a bit of work during race week, but probably not that much, resting quite a bit, but also not overdoing it. Most importantly tapering properly means having a plan and sticking to it.

To often I have seen athletes get caught up in the excitement of race week and wandering away from the plan of their taper. Either doing too much work close to race day, or losing focus and not doing enough. By now people should be well into their taper and so now is not the time to be second guessing it or making tweaks. Instead now is the time to have faith in the process and stick to the plan.

People often get nervous during taper because they expect to feel great and be jumping out of their skin. That can happen, but often people feel lethargic and actually a bit rubbish. That is pretty normal, but when people feel that way they can start to doubt their taper. They start thinking they need to do more, or do less, or that they might be getting sick etc. Once again, these feelings are pretty standard, but the important thing is that people stick to the process laid out before them. Small adjustments are fine, but if your coach has designed a taper for you, then have faith that they have put together the plan that they feel is best for you.

Stay calm, stick to the plan, follow the process.