Motivation without competitions

It is happening to all of us, the competitions to which we were registered this season are being dragged to the cancellation by a "Tsunami" caused by the happy "bug". The question we all ask ourselves is; and now that?.

It happens to all of us, we fix our training and preparation for the season towards a certain objective, we establish preparation tests, we organize ourselves with the family and even, in some cases, we ask for vacations at work to be able to go away for a few days calmly towards the location on duty where our objective test is held.

All that has been truncated this year, our training routine, and our life (because let's not forget we are amateurs and we have a life parallel to sport) has been suddenly modified by something completely unforeseen.

A large majority of the athletes I train tell me that they have lost the desire and motivation necessary to train constantly, to get the energy and time that they used to gladly seek by organizing themselves at home to get up early or train after work. .

Changes are always uphill at first, we have to adapt and change our habits and way of thinking, it is not easy, especially at the beginning. But they are certainly worth it if we want to continue advancing or, on the contrary, abandon ourselves to our fate.

Whenever one of my athletes argues with me (something that affects more people every day), I always show them the following keys:

A season without competitions does not have to be a blank season

It is a unique opportunity to train that adaptation or adaptations in which we are weakest. As examples: the base periods that are more tedious to train in cycling or triathlon as they coincide with the months of cold and low light, we can prepare them with more time in advance, or arrive at that period with a better and more prepared physiological base. that allows us to increase our performance. On the other hand, if our weak point is the ports and we know that our objective test has them and they mark the result, we can take advantage of these months of good weather to work hard on this part of the preparation.

Objectives must change in terms of their purpose

Now we should not pursue a specific brand or figure, but rather establish goals in terms of our characteristics as an athlete (lose weight, achieve a certain FTP, move a specific watts/kilo, etc.), in this way we will directly contribute to our future preparations are made from a more complete starting point and allow us to climb a couple of steps in our performance.

There is a minimum period to prepare a season

We all know that if we do not do a minimum preparation time we will not be able to improve or even finish a long-distance or ultra-long distance test. But this "mandatory" period (let's say) is a time that we must do as a minimum to obtain results, maximum times do not exist and they can help us (if we choose the loads well) to increase our performance on the appointed day.

We have vital time to analyze what we have worked on in other seasons and what has been the result

With many athletes I find myself in the same situation, they have been training for the same years, making the same mistakes and basically getting bad results over and over again. If this is our case, we can take advantage of these months to analyze what we have done, what we have stopped doing and above all how we have done it, so that we are able to draw conclusions from our preparation and see what deficits we have had and where to influence with more insistence.

Planning is the key

Knowing how to identify realistic goals for our fitness, calculating how many weeks it will take us to obtain these results and, above all, selecting the appropriate loads to work on are the keys to proper preparation. Many think that training more kilometers or climbing more mountains makes things better, nothing could be further from the truth, in amateur athletes (even at certain points in the preparation of high-level athletes) sometimes less is more.

The relationship between effort and rest, the variability in training, the progression of the workload, the type of planning to use at each moment of preparation, do any of these concepts sound Chinese to you? Put yourself in the hands of a qualified and endorsed professional in sports training, you will see improvements from the first weeks.

The visualization of a goal

It will give us the necessary push when motivation falters. Faced with an event as unexpected and changing as this we have two options; or stand idly by "watching life go by" and turning into little balls of fat or see ourselves crossing the goals that this year we have not been able to cross, with a preparation, which if we choose and prepare well can make us arrive in a moment exquisitely as we have never had before, one scenario or another depends on us. I always say the same thing, if professional athletes who play so much money and prestige are capable of changing the chip, restarting and setting new future goals, how can we not be able to play absolutely nothing except test ourselves and improve ourselves?

I hope I have been able to shed a little light among all this "marabunta" that we live today, I myself have seen the opportunity to improve myself and obtain a level that I did not have before, I work every day and I try to motivate my athletes to that they follow my trail, we cannot let ourselves be carried away by negative and demoralizing sensations that only lead to self-destruction.

Set your new goals both long and short term, meet small challenges and work hard to achieve a level that you had not known until now, take this time that has been "given" to us as an opportunity to improve yourself and do not fall into laziness and neglect, you know that in sports nobody will give you anything! You are the main actor in this play.

If you need help to guide your preparation or are looking for a coach who can guide you to face the new season, I will be happy to help you, contact me without obligation at the following email address: bestyourself@outlook.es or on my website: www.bestyourselftraining .com (Operational soon).

Author : Manuel Brihuega Jiménez - Technical director and trainer.