Hello Out There?

It's hard to believe, but the triathlon season has ended and I'm now smack dab in the middle of that curious grey area known as the transition season. You see, there are two transition periods during this time of year, actually. The first, occurring now, is a down-transition, as I call it, where training gradually gets a little shorter in volume, a little less intense, yet we'll continue to try and simply maintain all that great improvement developed over the past year. The second transition is what I call the up-transition, which I'll start at the end of October. During this time, the up-transition, I'll start ramping up the volume again, keeping the intensity low, but basically starting the annual cycle all over again.

So what happens in between these two transition periods? Well, nothing. Three weeks, to be exact, of absolutely nothing. Okay, okay, sure. Maybe a mountain bike ride or two, maybe some good trail running (sans heart rate monitor!), maybe some leaf raking. Alright, definitely some leaf raking. But basically, nothing. Not one structured workout for 3 weeks. And even though that sounds like a very short period of time... It usually only takes 3 or 4 days before I'm going bonkers for some structure.

So in the near term, during the down-transition, there's a lot of running on the plate. After spending an entire year trying to gain speed, strength and endurance to run fast 5- and 10k's, I'm now tasked on a somewhat regular basis with explaining to my body why exactly we continue to run after the 1.5 hour mark each long-run session. But to run the 26.2 will be worth it, and not 2 minutes after crossing that line will my 3-week vacation start.

It's always a mix of emotions during this time of year though. On the one hand, it's nice to be feeling things wind down. To not look off into the distance and see nothing but race, after race, after race to prepare for. Yet, on the other hand, race season is just filled with so much positive energy - energy of all kinds - and it just fuels the athlete on a day-to-day basis, whereas during the off-season, things can get a little mundane and trying. It's hard to train for August's races in November.

From November 1 of last year, I've kept a running list of things I've learned this year, things I've accomplished, and things I've vowed to improve upon this off-season. I have to admit that a little part of me is eager just to get to the end of the season so I can truly reflect upon this list in its entirety, and begin to build my training schedule for 2005-06. But knowing how fast Fall tends to roll on by, my mental game from here on out is to see just how many more things I can add to my list between now and the end of the marathon so that in the 3 weeks which follow that long run, we'll have plenty to talk about here on The Daily Grind.