Athlete Blogs
May 11th, 2009The worst - not really - but the worst....
I have to say it, I HATE rest days. I really hate them. Two in a row? Like torture.What I hate is I really miss the rush, the hard work, the effort of real workouts. Riding easy for 45 min or taking the whole day off just drives me nuts.
But, and this is a HUGE but, they are so important. If you don't rest, allow your body plenty of time to recover and get stronger, you will never benefit from all the hard work. You will just get slower and sick.
I actually spend quite a bit of my time as a coach convincing riders to take time, recovery so they can come back stronger and faster. I know this, but I still hate taking time off.
Anyway, today was a rest day. I rode 30 min super easy, stretched and did some massage. Tomorrow will be the same, easy ride on the TT bike outside, stretch, massage, rest.
The good thing about forcing yourself to rest properly, is that the really hard workouts, like VO2 work, will be possible AND you will have more motivation to complete those workouts.
So Wednesday I'm doing VO2 work, on a hill, on my TT bike in preparation for the Town Hill time trial on Friday evening. Wish me luck - I'm shooting to break the course record, it was set by some fast guy with hairy legs last year...
Cheers,
Pete
