A little break

Stayed in bed this morning. It wasn't Plan A, but just wasn't feeling it and so took the easy option. Not something I do that often, although it certainly happens a lot more than it used to.

In a little bit of a motivational hole at the moment. Happens to everyone from time to time and so I am not too concerned, given I don't have any high priority events coming up I am kind of happy to ride it out. From my experience you usually discover your mojo again with time, so going to keep reminding myself of that.

Not sure where this current motivation slump has come from. I suspect part of it is sleep related,  because, you know, it usually is. Not enough sleep always makes it hard to get out of bed. However, I think a bigger part of the motivation short fall is because I have been training pretty solidly for a bit over a year now, probably close to 14 months, without too much of a break.

It is funny the lessons you preach but don't necessarily listen to yourself. I suspect this may well be an example of not learning from my own lessons. I tell my athletes all the time that they need to take an off season. From my experience 18 months is about the time you can train for non stop before either your body or your mind stops you. That isn't based on any science, it is just how long it has taken my body to stop me in the past. I would be getting close to that point now and that is exactly what is happening. I am currently nursing a couple of over training niggles and my mental drive, something that I typically consider to be one of my strengths, is a little low.

It is funny, the reason I have ignored my own coaching is because I am training so much less than I used to. I guess I have been telling myself that because the training load is so much less, then it mustn't be taking so much of a mental toll. I am starting to think that might be misguided reasoning.

The other reason I have kept pushing so hard for so long with the training is because I have been paddling and I am relatively new to it. I like doing a sport well and so I have been pushing myself to improve as quickly as possible. That has meant that when others were taking an off season last winter I was still training, seeing it as an opportunity to keep pushing and making up ground. The upshot of that is that I trained all through last year, starting back in December 2017. I have to say, it worked, I have improved rapidly in this sport, but I might be paying the price for it now. We encourage athletes to take breaks in their calendar to ensure their training is sustainable long term, I have done the exact opposite, sacrificed long term consistency for short term gains. I will certainly be continuing the journey in the sport, but the price I am currently paying is a potentially unplanned break due to niggles and waning motivation levels.

So where to from here? Well, I have no intention on stopping training, but I might just shift around what I am doing a little. Like I said at the start of the blog, I know from experience that motivation generally returns after a couple of weeks, so I might do things a bit different for a bit until the magic returns, perhaps a bit more cross training, a little less paddling, worry about fitness less and instead make sure I am doing things that I am enjoying. I gave myself a bit of a quieter period over Christmas hoping that would do the trick, but I think I might need to extend it for a bit longer.

The good thing is that now is not a bad time to have a bit of a quiet period. I have a race in a week and a half, but it isn't necessarily an A race and it will also be a lot of fun, so it won't be hard to find the motivation for that one. Other than that this period is pretty quiet. Time for a bit of a break and come back in February ready and recharged to go.