I wish I had acknowledged it earlier. First the lack of energy and motivation to go and get the workouts done. Then, the extra time needed to recover. Lastly, the chest cold that didn't seem to completely resolve itself. All of these culminated this week in me finally admitting defeat and accepting it for exactly what is was, a classic burnout.
In some respects, I'm glad this happened. I find it the most brilliant part of our human bodies. The inbuilt CPU giving the signal to stop and recuperate. I find when we reach our unknown limitations, it allows us to learn, to improve the next time around. Now that I understand and know, not only my ability to ignore certain symptoms, but also what the first signs of those symptoms are, will only benefit me later in the season, the next year and years after.
What is ironically amusing, is the total lacking in the "practice what you preach mentality". I had a good year under my belt and felt that pushing it a little harder and plodding on my body could handle it, as it had before, and there would only be benefits even though I continued to preach Maffetone's methods and tell people how important it was for an injury and illness free season. Yet, there I was, tricking myself in to believing that I could tweak this, apply it differently to myself, and it would all be fine. Not so!
The chest cold never went away, just subsided for a while. Probably has manifested now in to something worse and am hoping that a good few days stepping away from training and exercise altogether will allow my body to take care of itself and repair as necessary. Add in some good fuels and I hope to be up and running again in about a week.
It is a time to celebrate, I think. A time to be happy. Be happy in the fact that I was able to restrict myself and not simply push on like a madman and prove that triathlon is an addiction that can be managed and not be all consuming - although I let it try for a few weeks. Let's just hope the body will recover and do what I hope it can do.
Good luck to us all!
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