After the last race of the season it is time to recover. After a long season it is time to restore your mind and body so that you are able to start the next season balanced and fresh. There are some key things to consider when planning your recovery to make your self mentally fresh and restore your body without loosing all of the fitness that you worked so hard over the past year to gain.
Leaving it all behind...for now
1. Take a week off from planned workouts. Give yourself a chance to catch up on things that you have let go while training whether this is some quality family time without any self absorbed distractions, catching up on work or doing a project outside of training. This week is the time to get all of that in order. Once you have a start to it be sure to make adjustments in your training over the next couple of months to bring back some balance.
2. Start with at least some aerobic activity the following week. You don’t want to loose what you have worked so hard to gain this year. On the second weak begin doing some aerobic exercise. The effects of detraining dramatically reduce aerobic fitness after 12 days. So whether it is a form of cross training that you have been missing or an exciting journey that you have been thinking about taking but specific training has been keeping you from it, now is the time to do it. Take advantage of your freedom from goals that are closing in and do something different.
3. Add some sort of flexibility training. Now is a good time to get in the habit of doing some sort of flexibility training in. This is usually the first thing to go when time becomes a factor and you are crunching in miles before your big event. There are many programs available and forms of exercise to do explore the options and pick one that suites you.
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