Rest With As Much Intensity As You Train

BIKE: 13 miles in 60 mins.

I’ve been told by my training plan that I should rest with as much intensity as I train. In previous years, with only 70.3’s in my schedule, I ignored any such advice. Rest? Are you kidding? I don’t work that hard! So I’d cut back a few hours and call it a recovery.

Nowadays when I’m told to rest, I don’t question it. Rest is golden. Heaven. A luxury. A good 8-hour sleep is often an elusive phantasmic entity that I look for every night and only sometimes come close to. I eat enough, I train enough, but I don’t get much of that 3rd training component. So when The Plan says to rest, what do I do? Work on the house instead. I should be sleeping!

So it was with this in mind that I skipped speedwork today. Doing 3 to 4 1-mile repeats at 5K pace is not my idea of rest. Besides it sounded damned hard. So instead I worked on trim for the bedroom and I’m pleased to report that the room is almost done!