I’ve started doing an Out Season plan from Endurance Nation. The theory is to get faster in the off-season. The workouts are shorter in duration but, typically, intense. This is quite different from most plans that focus on long, slow distance in the off-season.

Well, this morning I got up and really didn’t want to do the workouts. Today was a two workout day – both a bike and run. The bike was an hour with two 15 minute efforts at my functional threshold (this means that it hurts). Then, an easy 40 minute run.

I was tired. Just wanted to sleep. But, I knew it was easier to get the workout done in the morning. I didn’t want to have to think about it all day. So, I got on the bike and did the workout. It hurt. These workouts always hurt. But, I can deal with it because I know I’m getting faster.

Got off the bike and headed to change into running clothes. Its raining. Its chilly (in the 40s). Maybe I should wait until the afternoon to do the run. No, get it out of the way. It was just a sprinkle or light rain. I’ve always kind of liked running in the rain. Rain is OK. Rain and cold are a lot harder. Anyway, I went ahead and changed clothes and went out for my run. Ended up being a great run and loosened up my legs after the bike. Got home and had a great, hot shower. Then, this left the rest of my day open to get lots of work (and a nap) done.

My lesson from today – often you don’t want to do what you need to. At these times, you have to Just Do It! You have to turn off that little voice telling you all the reasons not to do it and Just Do It! Once you do it, the next time you don’t want to, you can remember the day you did it and do it again.

The next time that litte voice says “you don’t need to do it,” tell yourself “I need to Just Do It!” Then, go do it!

When people decide to take on a new physical challenge – a 5K run, their first swim meet, a sprint triathlon - they typically jump into the physical training.  I know I did.  Experienced athletes also typically focus on physical training.  What is often neglected is nutrition training.  Yes, your nutrition needs training too.  Nutrition is the one thing that can end your race day before it even starts.  Example: your doing an out of town race and decide to try a new sushi restaurant the night before your race.  All goes well until the next morning when you discover you can’t leave the bathroom.  Or, you can leave the bathroom but end up with stomach cramps, vomiting, etc.  No race day for you after all that physical training you’ve done.

We also tend to focus on what we’re going to eat the day of the race: breakfast, pre-race, during, post-race.  However, I’ve worked with many athletes who have race day gastro-intestinal issues (GI issues) that don’t relate to what they ate the day of the race.  The issues can relate to food eaten one to two days prior to your race.  When planning your race nutrition, you need to practice, at a minimum, your night before eating.

If you notice you’re having GI issues during your training, look at not only what you’re eating the day of your training, but the two days before.  You may find you need to go to white, low-fiber bread because the closer to a big training day your body can’t handle the additional fiber.  Or, you may find that something about oranges sets your stomach off (yes, I’ve had a client not be able to eat oranges prior to a race/training).  Notice when you add or remove foods what happens to your training/racing.

If you are doing a race out of town, one of the last things you need is the stress of finding somewhere to eat the night before the race.  What I do is find a reputable chain restaurant for my pre-race dinner.  Know the menu, know what you’ll order, any modifications you’ll make and order it.  Or, stay somewhere you can cook so you know what you’ll be getting.

As far as race day, practice what you’ll do during the race in your training sessions.  The rule of thumb: if it works OK in training, it won’t work on race day;  if it works great during training, it should work OK on race day.  Know what you’ll eat and how your body responds.  If you’re traveling, pack your race food with you.  If you can’t pack it, know what stores carry it and have a backup plan.  I had a racer tell me that is wife raced with the frozen peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (they work well in special needs bags of long course triathlons – they thaw by the time you reach your bag).  They couldn’t pack them for the trip, but planned to pick them up when they arrived at the race site.  They ended up spending much of the afternoon searching for them in all the stores and finally found them.  Talk about added pre-race stress.

Having your pre-race and race nutrition nailed down will give you one less thing to worry about on race day so you can focus on having a great physical race.

Its officially SUMMER!  For those of us in the Houston area, I think its been summer since about March.  Here, it went from pleasant to HOT in a matter of days without any time to acclimate to the change in temperature.  This means that our bodies don’t quite know what do to as far as sweating.  You’ll probably find that you sweat more than usual until your body gets used to it.

During the summer it is particularly important to pay attention to how much you are sweating when you are exercising outside or even working in your yard.  Studies have shown that as little as a 1 to 2% drop in body weight can impact your athletic performance.  Or, you can swing the other way and over-hydrate.  Studies have also shown that we can be pretty good at estimating how much we are drinking but we can’t estimate how much fluid we are losing through sweat.  Personally, when I’m doing triathlons I find that I tend to under-hydrate on the bike and over-hydrate on the run.  The result – a sloshy stomach accompanied by stomach cramps.  Not a fun way to do the run.

Most people are also spending time outdoors gardening, working on their house, etc.  Don’t forget the importance of hydrating when you are outside in the heat (regardless of activity type) for a period of time.

How can you monitor your hydration?  One of the easiest things you can do is to weigh yourself before and after you workout or before and after you work outside in the heat.  Both times you weigh, you should be nude (or in the same dry clothes) and dry (take a minute to towel off before stepping on the scale – don’t forget to towel off your hair, too).  For every pound you’ve lost, you should drink 16 – 24 oz of fluid over the next couple of hours.  Two pounds or so lost, I’m not concerned.  More than three pounds lost and I start to get concerned about dehydration.  Going in the other direction, if you find you are gaining weight, you could be running the risk of being over-hydrated and should consume a little less fluids.

For the athletes out there, you may have read that some studies have shown that high performance/professional runners are dehydrated when they finish a race.  I’ve heard people use this data to argue that you should finish a run dehydrated.  However, keep in mind that each person is different, but most people I know can tell a performance difference if they are dehydrated in the form of headache and/or just not feeling right.  To me, there is quite a difference between those professionals whose job is to run and those of us mere mortals who run/train in addition to our other jobs.  As people train, their bodies adapt to that training.  I’ve had the opportunity to run with Jeff Galloway a couple of times in 2000 and 2001.  I asked him about what he drinks before and during runs since he didn’t have any fluids with him.  At that time, he would drink a couple of cups of coffee before a long run and would be OK without other fluids on the run.  Now, how many marathons had Jeff run at that point?  More than I have fingers and toes I believe.  Therefore, for professionals and highly trained people (like Jeff), that may mean their bodies can handle performing in a dehydrated state.  For most others who are not training for hours every day, I’m not sure this is a good idea.

Finally, if you are exercising outdoors consistently, I’d recommend conducting a sweat trial every month or so.  A sweat trial can help you figure out how much you should be drinking and can help you figure out a starting point for salt/electrolyte intake. You want to do it on a shorter workout so you don’t have to also account for urine output. Here’s the steps (get out those calculators again):

1) weigh yourself nude/dry before your workout
2) weigh yourself nude/dry after your workout
3) multiply the amount of weight you lost by both 16 and 24 (it takes about 16 – 24 oz, maybe more to replace every pound of fluid lost)
4) To the two numbers you got in #3, add the oz you drank (both water and sports drink). Again, you get two answers.
5) Divide the numbers you got in step 4 by the hours of your workout. This gives you an oz per hour to shoot for. Then, you can break this into 4, 15 minute or 6 10 minute drinking intervals. Some people find that marking their water bottle every 2 to 4 oz helps them track how much they are drinking and when.  If the numbers you get are unrealistic (e.g. 80 oz per hour), then you need to determine how much you can realistically drink without negatively impacting your performance.

Second, is to look at electrolyte needs.  For every 4 cups (32 oz) the guideline is you need to take between 500 and 1000 milligrams of sodium. Some people need more, some less. This is a starting point. If you are crusty when you finish working out, you need to be on the higher end or perhaps even more.  You can and should get this during your workout through sports drink/salt tablets/etc.

Also, you should do sweat trials several times through out the year because we sweat differently in the spring than in the summer and fall.