Season Cut Short

We are in a situation now where many of you were unable to finish your season as planned. I never really had this situation, but as a coach, I also need to think what I would have done in a similar cercumstance. 

I came to three different options, which also depend on your individual situation:

Option one-

Your season gets cut short while you are in the middle of a training block preparing for a great final countdown of season 2019/2020. 

In this case, you are probably lucky that you are not alone in the area and you have other athletes around you, who are in the same boat and also would like to finish their season as planned. In this situation I would suggest to try and keep your schedule, and plan with the other athletes some training races. Take these “races” seriously!  Otherwise there is no benefit of going this direction. You could even wear a bib, but maybe even more important to push you to the limits, is to add some bragging rights to the competition.  No one likes losing, especially when there is something on the line! The problem with training races is often that your subconscious doesn´t take it as serious and will not let you go 100%. Having something on the line, like the loser must prepare the race skis form everyone in the race and make them ready for summer, will give you this extra push as well as getting the chance to get the skis ready for summer! This is just an example, but finding triggers like that, will be fun and makes sure it is a real race and you give 100% effort. So think about something that everyone would really like to avoid doing :)

If you are going this direction, please share your story!

If you don´t have anyone to race against, you maybe can take lactate at the end and punish yourself, if not reaching a certain number. Just get creative to make sure you are full on racing. 

Option two. 

You are kind of happy the season is over. You are feeling very tired, burned out, not in shape anymore, or just done with this season. 

Take advantage of the situation and end your season right now. Take a good break to recover both mentally and physically! Get some good sleep, eat good/healthy food, read an interesting book about anything but performance related topics. Don´t forget to move a little bit, but no planned or scheduled training. After two weeks you should start to feel better, and also ready to join a party ;) If you go this option, I would recommend starting training season as many weeks earlier, as you cut short on this season. In this way you extend your base level training to set a much better foundation for next race season. Again, you extend the endurance focus, you don´t want to train to be in your best shape in May or June. 

Option three.

You are feeling pretty good, but lost your motivation to race. 

In this case, I would still take a short break of 2-4days. After that, start a good endurance block of two to three weeks, or until snow conditions are not exciting anymore and then take a spring training break. Depending on your location, you can mix mostly xc-skiing, with some bc-skiing, or ski touring. Also, get in some sessions in the gym. For this block, I still would recommend to write and follow a plan with detailed training sessions and off days. Sessions are, of corse, adjustable, depending on conditions, but having a written plan is giving you a good guidance and you don´t have to decide every morning what to do with this day. After this block, I would go into your Spring-recovery phase to re-charge for next season.

If there is an option I did not have in mind, please let me know and I will think about what I would do in this scenario!