Post rally depression is a real thing. Coming off the back of weeks (and in our case for Rally South Australia 3 whole months) of anticipation and preparation, then adrenalin of the rally itself, is a big high to come down from.
The week of the rally I make my training a lot lighter and it’s really just about stretching the legs, feeling energised and keeping the stress levels down before the action starts.
So, coming back after the rally, I was pretty aware of the need to get the Ironman training back up to speed pretty quickly. I took the Monday off and dived straight back into it on Tuesday. However, by Friday I had never been so tired. I missed my Friday sessions and only got through half of what I wanted to do over the weekend. I had absolutely zero energy. I really didn’t appreciate the mental energy the rally took out of me and was feeling pretty annoyed at myself for cancelling sessions. I get pretty OCD about the colour coding on my Training Peaks schedule, which goes red when you miss sessions. I like to have everything green!
Coming down of the rally high, missing my training sessions, feeling like rubbish, oh yeah, what a top week…
I think the best thing that I did was still do some training over the weekend, even if it was at a lower intensity and less than planned. It felt pretty average too, but I felt better for doing it.
Doing something was equally important from a physical perspective as it was mentally to stay in the routine. The other good thing was knowing I had this blog, so I couldn’t take any more days to be lazy!
Also turns out it a few easy days was what I needed as I feel like I’m suddenly kicking lots of goals this week.
Full disclosure, here’s last week’s training:
