Trails and Travails

Mike, after catching up a bit it does sound to me like you're doing the right thing. Burnout/overtraining is not a pretty picture but all of us who have trained heavily over long periods of time have to take it into consideration at some point.



Here's hoping things will straighten out/become clearer to you in short order.

Mike, after reading the past few days, I feel for you. it does seem like a mental slump over the level of effort you've sustained. I agree that 16 week programs are easier to handle but obviously there is a small trade-off (maybe) on performance. It does seem that your curtness with those situations may indicate crossing the line on training. I am sure you will work through this. Just a thought - is there some other stressor in your life right now that is maybe causing or exacerbating this?

You've already gotten some good advice. I think the long training cycles are difficult. You are a good runner but there is obviously more to your life (and everyone else's) than just running. Sorry nothing new to add.

I can only pass on what has worked for me when I hit overtraining. I take off the watch and "just run". I recommend it highly. Break away from tracking details about runs and just go out there "for about an hour" or whatever whenever you feel like it. Maybe you will be running fast, maybe you will be running slow. But mentally you will appreciate not running in a way that is structured and recorded. You've put in too much work to push away from the table and not get back to training soon. Relax a little, recharge and then get back out there.

I got into Boston.

I haven't run since Thursday. That isn't likely to change soon.

Mike congrats on getting into Boston. I hope you get your mojo back. It's all good.

Congrats on Boston, Mike.

I'm glad you're taking some time off running, what are you doing in its place? Get back into it when you're ready and congrats on getting into Boston.

Mike I'm so fucking stoked that I will get to see you in April!! Yeah buddy this sure does make my day!

Congrats on getting in to Boston, Mike. I'm sure you'll be champing at the bit to run it once the time gets closer.

Good job on the step-back. Sounds like it was needed.

Glad you got into Boston Mike! Enjoy your respite. Then come back strong as ever.

Mike
I have been having similar feelings for about 10 months; I think everyone does.
It started with a small bout of overtraining, I added a pretty hard strength training program without backing off mileage, and turned into melancholy. I have had terrible training cycles since, but still PRed in the Mile, 3000m, 5K, 10K, and 1/2 Marathon; I even won a small race outright. Alas, these small victories were savored for hours or days, not weeks.My current training cycle is crap, but hey I still have a race to run.

When you get your head back together, let me know what works.

Julie wrote:I'm glad you're taking some time off running, what are you doing in its place? Get back into it when you're ready and congrats on getting into Boston.

Lots of introspection - but not too much so as to obsess over "WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?!?!" - and a bit of cycling. Details below. Sort of.

Gobbles wrote:Mike
I have been having similar feelings for about 10 months; I think everyone does.
It started with a small bout of overtraining, I added a pretty hard strength training program without backing off mileage, and turned into melancholy. I have had terrible training cycles since, but still PRed in the Mile, 3000m, 5K, 10K, and 1/2 Marathon; I even won a small race outright. Alas, these small victories were savored for hours or days, not weeks.My current training cycle is crap, but hey I still have a race to run.

When you get your head back together, let me know what works.

Sounds like we had similar lead-ups to our slumps. I went from a max of just under 70 miles during my last marathon training cycle (mid-high 50s average mpw) to averaging well over 70 for the last couple months, maxing at 107. Added doubles (from 1 day/week to 4... then slowly down to 2, though it was too late) and increased my sorta-long run length to long run length while packing on another long run on the weekends. All in all, a pretty stupid idea, in hindsight.

But to address getting my head back together... I've got a ton of cliches lined up to describe my game plan. For one, game plan. Two, I'm letting the cards fall where they will. Et cetera. A long while back, Mr. Baldo and I had a brief exchange regarding allowing one's purpose to show itself rather than conducting a grueling search for it. This is more or less what I'm doing now. I'm letting my body and mind tell me what they want, and I'm doing my best to listen to them.

Have I "slipped up?" Sure. I was unsure of whether I wanted to go out on a bike ride Tuesday afternoon, and again I turned myself around after just a couple minutes. Sometimes I'll give so much thought to whether or not I actually WANT to do something or if it's just habit that I'll completely miss the point of this: to calm the fuck down.

Most of all, I'm just working on accepting what happens for its face value. Instead of bashing myself for bailing on a bike ride or making any sort of mistake, I'm trying to gracefully accept that I'm human... This is an excessively difficult task for someone who generally strives for perfection and tends to trust reason and logic more than instinctual drives.

But realizing that my entire life (maybe a tiny bit of an overstatement, but barely) was a construct rather than something that naturally fell into place... That's helping the process. I was missing the forest through the trees, focusing on making sure that every minute, hour, and day were followed according to the set of rules I'd made for myself. So, as best I can, I'm taking those rules and tossing them. Things as seemingly insignificant as having only one cup of coffee per day: blatantly ignored and somewhat intentionally broken.

I'm sure that hardly any of this is universally applicable - I'm much crazier than most of the people I know - but I'm unloading it here in case someone stumbles upon this and says, "hey, that sounds like me."

Anyway, just wanted to drop a brief update, so there it is. I'm spending a good amount of time in my head, but also an equally good amount of time out of it. I feel like a bit of a holistic, new-wave yuppie, but I think there's something to be said for a bit of self-maintenance.

I've had two flats on the bike - need to throw some Gator Skins tires on it - and have regained a bit of my cycling legs. I still haven't run. I think I'll want to soon, and probably would even enjoy it if I laced up and hit the trails tomorrow, but I'm waiting for the itch.

Mike MacLellan wrote:I'm sure that hardly any of this is universally applicable - I'm much crazier than most of the people I know - but I'm unloading it here in case someone stumbles upon this and says, "hey, that sounds like me."

It's a lot more universally applicable than you might think, Mike, and you may actually be more sane than the others.

And yes, it sounds like me. Or, to be exact, it sounds like me when I was about your age.

You're on a great journey of discovery. I'm going to enjoy seeing where it takes you.

Glad you're taking some time off and some time to think, too. Running and cycling and everything can be really good but there is more to life than running and cycling and everything. And even perfectionists aren't perfect. But you know this.

Hey Mike I have more to say but not sure if I want to put such a long post into your blog. I will say this "hey, that sounds like me." yep I have to agree with you on that and you are not alone because a lot of what you said does sound a lot like me in the past, present and I'm certain it will happen in the future. There is no doubt that you are not alone!

Hey, that sounds like me

Again, appreciating all the support from you guys (and gals). Still no plans that extend past the next hour or two, but that's part of the process.

Did a pretty good little workout on the bike yesterday. Lots of climbing, and lots of beautiful, forested back roads.

Ran this morning. Not sure how long or how far or how fast, but I felt like I was cruising pretty good and did a couple extended fartlek efforts when the urge hit.

Supposed to rain tomorrow afternoon-Wed, so I might have some enforced rest.

Mike--just catching up on blogs. Feeling overtrained is just about as miserable as it gets. When it ceases to be fun, you're doing something wrong.

Yeah just take your time coming back to running. Good for you for doing what you need to to recover from the over training stuff.

I was glad to see your post back to me on FB, Mike. Way to go. Just take it easy and one day at a time. Being addicted to running is just like anything else . I can tell you that what you are experiencing is very normal and probably happens to everyone at one time or another. Back when I was young and fast, I used to run a lot of miles (for me) and race a lot as well. I got to a point where I would show up at races and be able to size up the competition and tell you whether I would win or place (overall, not just in my AG) and the stress would often make me physically sick. It was at that time that I decided it was best to take a break and run or do anything else for me as that would be far better for my overall health and well being. I went to a bit of the extreme as I decided to cut way back on the miles, learn to play tennis and start a family, but it did work, and when I went back to competitive running in the late 1990s after a 6 year retirement, it was so totally worth it. This to will pass, and I will see you (or actually chase you through my hometown) in Beantown.

Pretty lazy week so far: short run Monday, short core/upper body workout yesterday... Got out on the bike this morning, but didn't feel particularly strong at any time. I actually feel like I'm tapering/recovering from a race right now. Kind of weird.

The Mt. Whitney bid has been rethought as a Yosemite trip instead. With the weather we're supposed to get up here, we could see snow on Whitney that weekend and I'm not really thrilled on that. Plus it's ~7hrs of driving for each of us (me and my dad). So Yosemite is a good alternative. Should be a good time. Maybe I'll have some inspiration to go on a run one morning while we're camping.

Mike MacLellan wrote:Pretty lazy week so far: short run Monday, short core/upper body workout yesterday... Got out on the bike this morning, but didn't feel particularly strong at any time. I actually feel like I'm tapering/recovering from a race right now. Kind of weird.

The Mt. Whitney bid has been rethought as a Yosemite trip instead. With the weather we're supposed to get up here, we could see snow on Whitney that weekend and I'm not really thrilled on that. Plus it's ~7hrs of driving for each of us (me and my dad). So Yosemite is a good alternative. Should be a good time. Maybe I'll have some inspiration to go on a run one morning while we're camping.

Yosemite sounds like a great alternative. Are you planning to stay in the valley, or in the backcountry?

We wanted to start at Tuolumne and head southeast towards... Something with a Germanic name. Vogle...something? But looks like it'll be cold as shit up there, too, so we're thinking instead of starting at Hetch Hetchy and going east towards one of the falls, camping there, day-hiking Saturday and Sunday from camp.

Mike MacLellan wrote:We wanted to start at Tuolumne and head southeast towards... Something with a Germanic name. Vogle...something? But looks like it'll be cold as shit up there, too, so we're thinking instead of starting at Hetch Hetchy and going east towards one of the falls, camping there, day-hiking Saturday and Sunday from camp.

Sounds like a cool trip, Mike.