Explain it to me- Training tired and sore- no rest days (Page 2)

breckview - 2009-08-17 12:07 PM
IMO, many triathletes tend to ramp up way too fast and then rest too often, which I think is the opposite of the way it should be if one wants to improve.

Rencor - 2009-08-17 11:38 AM

If I remember correctly you used to say you had terrible eating habits. Could that be the issue?

I'm no expert but I know poor eating wears me down as much as my training. Now that I know it I just have to do something about it

tjfry - 2009-08-17 12:48 PM

I've got a little different opinion than most of the posts here I guess. I think that training when tired and sometimes even sore (good sore not injury sore) is just fine and often necessary to achieve your goals.

I look at training as stress and recovery. You get get all technical but that's the basic premise. In order to get better you need to stress something and the recover from it so that your body heals and becomes stronger.

Some events or people's goals will require a workload that forces you to train multiple workouts tired or fatiqued. If your goal is a 9 hour Ironman then the stress you put on your body needs to prepare you for a 9+ hour effort. That means lots of workouts.

Saying that you are tired for the next workout and therefore need to rest is often too narrow of a focus. You're looking at the trees and not the forest. If you skip that workout b/c you're tired then why not cut a workout short b/c you get tired during a workout? Where is the line drawn? 

If tired= needs to rest, then you will never be able to stress your body enough for it to be strong enough to cope with the goals you want to achieve.
Just listen to the Hawaii Champions, they are exhausted for weeks on end in their preparation for Kona. But then they rest (taper) and win the race. They look at rest/fatigue on a very large scale, not just workout to workout.

Having said all of that, I will say that this can be overdone if you don't monitor it right. Also, most of those big names we read about with huge training volumes also take complete days off. The "I don't take rest days" group usually lies within the age group crowd where training load is not all that stressfull, so a full rest day isn't really needed.

My 2 cents

KSH - 2009-08-17 10:52 AM All right, I have had a few people ask me WHY as triathletes that we train all the time, vs. not having rest days and I say "just because". Or I give some explaination that we do it to make our bodies use to training sore, tired, etc. Yes, it's a lame answer. So, someone who is more elite and more of a pro at this stuff... a coach... etc... please explain it to me. Why if we are sore and tired, do we keep training day after day. Now, I'm not talking about training through fatigue... but just a general feeling of being sore and tired. For example, my cycling averages have been going down... but I'm not supposed to take a break. Instead, I'm to train through it. Keep going. Even if I'm sucking, I keep training. My quads are sore. I know I'll still run and swim tonight. Sore muscles are not. At what point does training through soreness not product results. Why do we keep training if our performance is not improving, but rather decreasing? Would it kill me to take two days off to rest? To recharge? To stop being sore? Or do I benefit more from training through the soreness? Let's discuss. Because I'm really curious.

Daremo - 2009-08-17 7:59 AM

No, take the rest days.  You will be better served in my opinion.

You have to know when to say when and listen to your body.  If you start a workout tired and it doesn't get better within the first 15 minutes or so, bag it and rest.  If you start it tired, and things click into place as the workout goes on?  That is a well designed plan and you are recovering well overall.

Too many athletes do not listen to their body and continue to push.  This is why so many of the elite runners are only at the pinnacle of their sport for 2 or 3 years.  They simply do too much and don't rest.

The idea should be "Do the least amount to get the most out" when it comes to training.  For some this will be 10 - 12 hours.  For others this may be 15+.

Bioteknik - 2009-08-17 4:25 PM



Who has told you to not rest?  They're wrong.   

Daremo - 2009-08-17 6:07 PM

A coach that is looking out for you should not just send you your workouts and say "Talk to you next month, have a nice time."  They should be evaluating what your workouts look like AFTERWARD and making adjustments to the next ones, even if you aren't always aware that they are doing it.

Anyone can prescribe workouts and get you to do them.  What separates those people from the good coaches is that the good ones adapt your training to what you are actually doing, how you feel and where things seem to need improvement.  It is a very hard thing to do.  But you are paying for a service to make you better while keeping you healthy and motivated.

It would be my opinion that someone who gives you a ton of workouts without building in some pure rest days (for a newer amateur athlete ..... not necessarily a very experienced one who is used to 15 - 20 hour weeks) may not be serving you in the best way possible.  You may not need one every week, but 10 - 14 days may be the sweet spot.  And sometimes people just need to take care of the other things in their life which are a hell of a lot more important than exercise .........

Just my thoughts.

KSH - 2009-08-17 6:44 PM



Well, that was how I trained for two years with two different coaches. Sometimes I only got rest days because I took them, not because they were in my training plan.

They didn't say NOT to rest... but when I get a training plan with every day booked... there ya go.

This year I'm working from a training plan out of a book. I have modified to fit my lifestyle. We will see how my HIM goes and if that approach is a good one.