Pity Party, All are Invited

Someone asked me the other day why I haven't been discussing my training much in my blog. The answer is two-fold. First, it slips my mind. When you do the same thing week in and week out, it becomes difficult to blog about it in an exciting way. Secondly, I am in a training funk.

Right now, training is not going very well. I am uncertain as to the root of the problem. Some of the issue is the heat we are experiencing. Some of it is likely fatigue on the body. Some of it may be mental. I just don't think I have trained well since New Orleans. As I make another final build toward my next big race, things don't appear to be falling in place for me.

My running is not coming along like I feel it should. Instead of seeing gradual improvement over the past few months, I feel like I have barely held my fitness. My long runs in fact are a bit slower. After running 385 miles this season, I would like to see the results show up more often in training versus hoping they are there on race day.

The more glaring problem is how much I am struggling on the bike. My long rides are falling apart. Too often, I am not able to hold my prescribed wattage. I can't explain how demoralizing it is to plan for a moderate intensity 3 hour ride and have it fall apart without too much explanation.

Yesterday was yet another disaster. My ride called for 3h 25m with 3h at 70-75% of FTP and then the last 15m at 75-80%. In theory, this should be an easy ride for me at this point. What unfolded was sheer carnage...

Time	Speed	% FTP	HR
30	19.7	70.5	145
30	19.6	72.5	150
30	19.4	68.4	150
30	19	67.6	150
30	18.4	61.5	149
30	16.8	54.3	147
20	17.7	44.5	146

I finished my first 31 miles feeling pretty good. I knew my watts had dropped but as I restocked with cold nutrition, I was ready to go out and work the next 31 miles with more intensity. As demonstrated in the chart above, that didn't happen. I was completely flat on the second lap. I tried hard to pull it together and only became more and more frustrated. At 2:45, I just gave up. I saw my speed and watts sinking faster than the Titanic.

This is quickly becoming a frequent occurrence. At this point, I can only speculate the cause. I am under the impression that post NOLA, I was overtrained as an attempt to peak again for Gulf Coast. I can't help but to wonder if it is now coming back around to bite me in the arse.

Dan and I are sitting down again this week to discuss. As it currently stands, we have completely different opinions on the source of the problem. All I know is that I don't want to go down this destructive path any longer. Right now, I am leaning toward shutting it down for summer and just racing sprints. I just don't think I can optimally perform at the longer distance...so why push it.