Too Much Of A Good Thing...

Makes for a Tough Spring

A few years ago, after a winter that didn’t totally go my way, I decided I would meet my impending spring melancholy by training extra hard. “If I just throw myself at running, biking, and working out,” I reasoned, “I won’t feel bleh about winter ending.”

I read The Uphill Athlete, a training manual about how to get fit by training within certain heart rate zones. It gets very science-y and textbook-like, but the gist of what I got from it is that you spend the bulk of your hours training (running, biking, hiking) in zone 2, which is pretty low heart rate, like below 120bpm or so. Then, once you’ve built up your base fitness, you can start adding in shorter workouts in zones 3-5. I took this as an endorsement to run and bike for as many hours as I could. I even got out my “road” bike and pedaled on that a few times! What an amazing program, I thought, for the first week or so. I can just keep pushing! I forgot all about overanalyzing every moment of the past winter, in the relentless pursuit of more miles. Tired? Well it says HERE IN THIS BOOK BY EXPERTS that I can keep going. Winter? What winter? I’m going to be an endurance athlete!

This lasted for a few weeks until I got sick. Out of nowhere, unexplained, total knockdown sick. It wasn’t COVID or pneumonia or strep throat, despite having numerous symptoms of all of those. I went to the doctor twice over three weeks until I finally went on antibiotics and got cleared up, but by that point let’s just say my base fitness was all but gone. Strictly zone 1 baby. I gingerly began walking and jogging again, but threw the training program out the window. Clearly I was doing it wrong.

I learned a few things from that experience.

First, The Uphill Athlete was clearly designed by men and based on data collected on male athletes. I’m not saying it doesn’t work for women—plenty of women use it and get super fit and crush hard! I’m just saying that Zone 2 is defined commonly as “where you can comfortably carry on a conversation.” And they do not realize that for the past 25 years, my girlfriends and I have been training while talking. This is what we do. We talk nonstop while riding and running uphill. My measure of Zone 2 might be off a wee bit.

Second, there are very few trails near where I live that are flat or rolling for long periods of time. Nearly every trail heads immediately straight up, gaining elevation quickly from the valley floor—very hard to keep in Zone 2 for me. And I was not willing to run on roads, because, I was trying to fit the program to me, not actually follow the program. Which brings me to:

Third, I often overlooked if my heart rate went above 120 for short amounts of time. I would jog uphill and realize I was breathing hard, and check my heart rate monitor, but then I would just sort of slow down and fudge things a little in my head. So, again, I was looking for what I wanted out of the program—which was permission to train hard and focus on something else than all the mixed emotions about winter ending—rather than strictly adhering to the program.

It was a huge learning moment. I learned that if I’m going to follow someone else’s workout program, I need to be clear on what I want out of it. I learned that I need to listen to myself, not just take the words off the page and do what they say. And most importantly, I learned that it’s important to reflect on each winter regardless of how it goes for me—the good, the bad, all of it. I now make it a point in the spring to go for walks (way under Zone 2!) and debrief what went well and what I can do better. Because I learned the hard way that trying to literally run from those uncomfortable thoughts gets me nowhere.

A few links:

This makes me laugh SO HARD. If you don’t get it, message me and I’ll explain it for you. :). (Youtube, 30 second comedy clip of Brett Goldstein)

If you needed more encouragement to take a walk, here are 5 reasons from my favorite NYT columnist, Jancee Dunn. (NYT, unlocked article)

This savory rhubarb and chicken recipe came recommended to me twice, so we made it last night and it is delicious, especially when served with mashed potatoes. :) (NYT, unlocked.)

Thanks for reading!

Ingrid