After gradually building my way up to around 80km per week I had a top training week a fortnight ago, probably my best week since returning to running. In hindsight however, I had perhaps overdone it, particularly on the long run at the end of the week. So going into the week beginning 26thAugust I was already a bit tired and in my Tuesday gym session went heavy on the trap-bar deadlift which, while producing a PB 1 rep max lift (130kg, 1.7x my bodyweight), really seemed to tip me over the edge into fatigue. As a result, I ended up missing all my sessions and long run that week which was a bummer to say the least.
Fatigue feels like it has become a complicated thing for me these days. In particular I find it exceptionally hard to wrap my head around how I am feeling and what is manageable training fatigue, what might be linked to mental health and what I should or should not work through. Partially this is because both my thyroid condition and depression/anxiety made me feel tired, grotty, fatigued and generally gave me a sense of malaise. While I am a lot healthier now, when fatigue ramps up I have found myself worried, or even convinced, that I have buried myself or worse that I am slipping back into a depressive episode.
It is quite frustrating, to put it mildly.
Now in the past week I managed to run 79km again, grinding (and it was a grind) through two run sessions and two gym sessions before getting to my long run on Sunday. While that long run was scheduled to be around 2hr 15 / 30km, I pulled the pin at 24km feeling very tired indeed. The conditions were surprisingly warm and while I had been running relatively fast, I was still feeling good at 18-20km. However, in the following few kilometres that changed quite a bit and, rather than bury myself, I decided to call it quits at 1hr 50 and save something for the following week.
On the surface of it that seems sensible enough, although after the fact I have wondered everything from whether I should have ‘hardened up’ and pushed through to whether I am actually up to or capable of running the Perth Marathon in a few short weeks (where I am hoping to qualify for Chicago next year), and surviving in good enough shape to continue training rather than stuck in a lasting fatigue.
If I sound unsure of myself, it’s because I am! One thing my mental health problem in the last year has taught me is that I have always had a tendency towards anxiety and catastrophising and the combination of my illnesses and a long time off has affectively made me even more unsure of my condition. I find it quite hard to accurately gauge how I feel and decide what to do about it. I imagine it must be quite frustrating for my family, friends and coaches!
However, that is not to say that I can’t see positives. I am definitely much fitter than I was a handful of months ago. While gym sessions have occasionally left me with more fatigue than I would like I am unquestionably stronger than I have been previously and as that strength and my running fitness come together, I hope it will pay off handsomely. And as I see it, the best way to gain a sense of self-assuredness about my physical condition and ability to handle fatigue is to continue training and testing the waters, perhaps even when sometimes I feel like I might be too tired to do it.
So onwards with this week’s training. I’ve gotten 40 minute and 50 minute easy runs in already, albeit I was still tired and they needed to be really quite slow to make it ‘easy’. With a bit of luck I’ll pick up through the week and finish feeling stronger.
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