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Hi Everyone!
Way to go everyone who is still getting out there and doing the best they can in these winter conditions. Just be extra careful when the footing is rough and slippery. A snowy kilometer is a lot harder on the body than a dry, clear kilometer, so just slow down and try to go with the flow.
This week I’ve been thinking about energy, and how that affects our running and training. It seems like it should be a simple concept.The famed Norwegian triathlon coach Olav Alexander Bu has coached some of the top athletes in the world by “sciencing” all the training. He is famous for explaining that training is just energy expenditure and can be measured and matched by calorie consumption. Energy in = Energy out. Of course there is also structural and system fatigue from muscles and the central nervous system in being able to create repeated efforts and forces. This is not as easy to measure, but is fairly simple to keep in check with a simple formula of hard/easy ratio. So as long as you have enough energy in the form of calories and you are giving your body ample time to bounce back between hard efforts,you should be able to perform at a predictable level.
In addition to physical energy availability, there has been some more recent interest in mental energy availability. Alex Hutchinson (SweatScience) has reported on mental efforts and their effects on training: Yes,your tired mind is slowing you down. Basically studies have shown that after strenuous mental tasks (which make no changes in muscle recruitment,heart rate, or breathing), exercise performance is hampered. There are theories as to why this might be, but suffice it to say that mental energy, along with physical energy, is a resource required for strong athletic performance.
That leaves a third source of energy, which I haven’t seen documented anywhere, but am sure has a significant effect on performance: emotional energy. As both a coach and athlete who experiences the emotional waves of being human, I have noticed that emotional energy is powerful. Yes, when performing a hard physical task, whether a workout or a race, you have to have enough calories, a healthy physical system, and it helps to be mentally fresh to remain focused on the task at hand. But it also helps to be emotionally available and engaged with a level of care and commitment in wanting to do the thing. I have noticed that when we are going through difficult emotional times, our bodies and minds might be ready and willing, but there is a big missing piece of energy. This does sound unscientific, I realize. I used to think that if you trained a body and set it in motion, it would perform to its capabilities. All measurements say it should. But in the real world we know that’s not the case. When athletes are going through difficult emotional times, it almost always spills over into their performance. Emotions are powerful, and on the flip side, when we can learn to use them to our advantage, we have an extra boost. Sometimes in big races we tell athletes to “run with heart”. We’re calling on their emotional strength to pull them to a result beyond what they might think possible, and this often works. The brain, body and heart (real and metaphoric) are all intertwined in a way we cannot measure. Energy isn’t just a calorie. It’s physical, mental and emotional. Just something to consider as we evaluate ourselves and our performances. If our athletic performance is a barometer of our health, we have to look at all the factors that influence it. So maybe we need another gym session or a hilly tempo session. But maybe some self care in the form of some easy jogs with friends, some solo reflective time, or even a few therapy sessions could go just as far if not further. Emotional energy could be the missing piece.
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