The taper blues arrived this week... My friend Carrie at Fitness and Frozen Grapes talks about the taper crazies; for me it is definitely a case of the taper blues, which, in conjunction with chronic depression is somewhat interesting. It's not entirely surprising, I've been training very hard (the last weeks have totalled 35.6k, 24.1k, 35.1k, 34.3k, 31.7k, 32.1k, 28k, 28.2k) and so my body definitely feels like it needs a rest. It felt weird not going to the lake on Monday night, and I was looking forward to doing my pilates DVD instead, but I was just too tired. Since Friday night I've felt REALLY tired, and ended up taking an extra rest day yesterday instead of heading down to Bournemouth for a sea swim (which, by all accounts was quite brutal...and it was raining), and didn't even really feel that much like swimming today, although it was ok when I did. Yesterday I also felt like I was fighting off the beginning of a cold, and remembering doing my half ironman with a cold last year made me feel a bit stressed.
Speaking to other people who have done similar marathon swims, less is definitely more in the last 10 days and I need to trust in that as it has led other people to success!! However, a little bit of me wonders if I left the taper a little too late. Hopefully not. I also need to adapt my diet a bit this week - I've spent the last couple of months focusing on optimising my protein intake, to keep me feeling full after a lot of exercise, and also to make sure that my muscles were being repaired. Now that I've stopped training hard, my glycogen feels a little bit depleted, so I need to concentrate on a carbohydrate rich diet for a few days. Luckily I have the week off work so I can hopefully rest a reasonable amount and not get too stressed (as an aside there are other stressful things going on for me right now, so I am hoping that they don't derail things too much!). The first pack of my bag is mostly done, but I still need to write my feeding plan and buy a few more things to eat :)
What did I do this week?
Monday - 3k pool swim am
Tuesday - 3k outdoor pool swim am
Wednesday - 3k pool swim am
Thursday - 4.1k pool swim am
Friday - OFF
Saturday - OFF
Sunday - 4k pool swim
=17.1k - shortest week for quite a while!!
What is the plan for this week?
Monday - 2-3k pool swim
Tuesday - 2-3k pool swim
Wednesday - 2-3k pool swim or OFF
Thursday - little splash in Windermere
Friday - big splash in Windermere :-)
Saturday - off
Sunday - recovery swim
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