Stop your Brain!

Even with the best planning and optimal recovery between training bouts, another obstacle can work it way into the equation: your brain.

Life gets in the way. It is an on going strategic exercise to fit in training sessions along with the obligations of work and family obligations in order to enjoy fitness gains and improve as an endurance athlete.  Training consistently is the key to improvement and doing so requires good recovery between workouts day in and day out.  Optimal recovery is rooted in adequate sleep and balanced, training specific nutrition as well as a regimen of training progressions that suits your needs. Even if you have the recovery nailed and your training plan is spot on, you still have to manage your time to fit it all in.  Still, endurance athletes are masters of the clock and somehow manage to fit the puzzle pieces together – most of the time.

It usually starts with negative thoughts about the weather, the length of our to-do list or maybe we are feeling a little tired. They are a myriad of other thoughts that might occupy our ’should I do this workout today or maybe I can do it tomorrow’, but the bottom line is, it can be easy to find a way to rationalize our way out of training.

Stop your brain! Don’t Think, Just Do.

If you find yourself beginning the workout debate “should I get up and swim…go out in the cold and ride/run, head to the gym, go to yoga class etc”, adopt the mantra, “Don’t Think, Just Do.”