Off-Season

Just in case it's not abundantly obvious to everyone, training in the off-season SUCKS. Big time.

The short days and the rain make for long hours on the treadmill and the trainer.

The holidays make for interrupted schedules and shuffling workouts to try to get them done.

The post-holiday blues make the training that much harder. Now it's just putting in the hours. No joy, no excitement, nothing to look forward to. It takes a dedicated athlete to train in the off-season.

Basta is dedicated. He's made up his mind to do this and he's doing the workouts. He's not enjoying it, though. He said this is really teetering close to this being, 'not fun.' He says he's not all that interested in doing an Ironman any more. He'll do the two Halfs that he's signed up for, then back off and stick to Sprints and Olympics.

That's fine with me. Who knows if that's what will really happen, though. This is just off-season blues talking at this point. We haven't had a competition in a while so there's been nothing to stimulate his excitement for competition.

He's not training with others, either. Training is largely solitary but joining a group can make it a lot more fun. He's a very social person and I think he'd enjoy a bike group, especially. He's been doing a lot of spinning lately and knows all of his fellow spinners now.

He's trying to change his workouts, too. If I have him down for a 90 minute run he wants to change it to 45 minutes today and 45 minutes tomorrow. I tell him, no, it doesn't work that way. He needs the long distance work to make the physiological changes in his body that only long distance will give him. He says, 'yeah, yeah, yeah, I know' but then runs 45 anyway. Sigh.

He is enjoying the benefits of training, though. His blood pressure is down to 93/60. His bodyfat appears to be nil. He says he wants to ingrain the routine of working out 6 days per week and continue that forever and ever, even if he stops doing triathlon someday.

That's an excellent goal. A goal I am working towards, too. The only reason we started triathlon was because it was a fun way to stay fit and become much more fit. Basta's desire for the podium has faded for now but it may rekindle with our next competition.

And that is the upcoming Surf City Marathon. We're both doing the Half Marathon. He's running a 10K in 48 minutes these days (7:58 pace), so I'm predicting he'll do this half in 1:46 or so. That'll be a PR.