Beyond The Workouts

The difference between training in-season and in-between seasons.

At this point, I no longer have a athletic seasons, like I used to through high school and college. I sign up for individual races or set a day when I plan to “max out” my lifts, and then I prep for those. Instead of having a football game or a cross country race every week, I’ve usually got about a 10+ week stint where I’m training for one thing. This block of training is often called a “prep”.

When I’m in a prep, or when I used to be in-season for a sport, it’s far more important that I stay dialed in. I’ve got to get my nutrition and sleep right. I need to hit my workouts on the days and times that I build my plan around. In short, I have a lot less flexibility.

But when I am just training for the sake of increasing fitness before my next “prep”, I have a lot more room for error. The priority is on sustainability, not perfection. I’ll carry around a bit more body fat and be more flexible with my schedule. During this time, it’s important that I prioritize “living” a little bit more than “training”. If I don’t, I’ll realize one day that I never really had a life.

Training Context

I’ve got to be very careful with my workload

Now that I’ve been logging 40+ mile weeks while doing high volume squat and deadlift workouts at >80% of my 1RM, I’ve crossed the threshold for when my legs start to accumulate some serious muscle soreness and fatigue. I want to be able to train at this level for the rest of the year, and then take leaps forward from there. This means I need to listen closely to my body.

I started tracking a “daily freshness” score. A subjective measure of how good I feel doing each of my workouts that day. Recent research has shown that this type of subjective assessment is actually a better predictor of how burnt out well-trained runners are than objective ones, like resting heart rate and heart rate variability.

The plot above shows that this freshness score has been on a steady decline the last couple weeks. I was overdue for a running deload week, so I decided to take one. It also coincided nicely with some travel. My updated training block progress can be seen below.

My priority is building strength while maintaining 40-50 mile weeks. My hope is this small break from running gives me the reset I need to keep moving forward.

Training Details

What Happened Last Week

22 Miles Ran

16,274 lbs lifted with upper body

21,167 lbs lifted with lower body

275 lbs e1RM Squat

345 lbs e1RM Deadlift

260 lbs e1RM Bench

173 lbs Body Weight

My lifting volume was nearly identical to the week before, but my main lift sessions looked a little different.

• My running miles went: 6,4,8,4,0,0,0

• Bench Sessions Monday and Thursday: Both built to a max single rep of 255 lbs

• Squat Session Tuesday:

  • 5×3×255

• Sumo Deadlift Session Friday:

  • 3×295, 3×295, 5×295, 5×295, 5×295

Goals For This Week

• Run 48 miles

• Bench: Deload week — 2 sessions of 3×10×135

• Deadlift - 5×3-5×295lbs

• Squat - 5×3×255 lbs

Training Tips

How to properly “deload”

My lack of running at the end of last week is not the proper way to do a “deload” week. For both running and lifting, deloads are necessary to give your body some rest while maintaining the routine. A proper deload involves maintaining the same kind of workouts you would normally do, but at far lower volume and intensity.

So, my weekly mileage was appropriate, but I should have spread it out over the normal 6 days a week I run instead of just running my normal daily mileage the first several days and then cutting out my weekend.

When lifting, you should still do your bench, deadlift, or squat sessions — just halve the weight from what you would normally do.

Go Do More

Find something to prep for

Have you been training in-between seasons for a while now? Maybe it’s time you sign up for a competition to give you a reason to “lock in” again. It’s about the perfect time to start prepping for a fast Turkey Trot. Why not use it as a chance to test your Hybrid Athlete Ratio, and add a powerlifting max out session earlier in the week?