Regeneration week is coming to an end

Sniff....sniff....easy week is over-I am awaiting my new program for May-which Mr. P told me would be kicked up a notch. Yikes!

Today my legs feel quite tired and achy. I did not anticipate this, as I have regularly been doing workouts just as long or longer than yesterday's. Strange how that happens!

Last night before bed, I was surfing the net for any information I can find about triathalons. I do this quite regularly-especially when there is crapola on the TV. Interesting tid-bit I found out was in regards to "hitting the wall" (runner's term) or "bonking" (cyclist's term). I am quite certain, that had I run a long distance at the pace I was running yesterday I most definitely would of "bonked on the wall" (Donna's term).

The article talked a lot about how this happens when your glycogen stores in your muscles get depleted. Glycogen is produced by ingestion of carbs-hence you often hear about runner's carbo loading before a race. This needs to happen well in advance, as a night of spaghetti before the big one is just not going to cut it. In endurance sports, your body will also pull energy from the glucose in your bloodstream and from any stored fat that you might have kicking around. The problem with the blood and fat energy sources, is that they peter out quite quickly, and your body can't use the fuel in fat efficiently. The key is to stay hydrated, eat consistently throughout the race (approx one power bar or it's equivilent every hour) and stay at an endurance heart rate pace-avoid anaerobic racing-unless you are doing short distances or are doing this in your training.

What perhaps was even more interesting to me is what you eat after the race. Apparently if you can get a whole whack of carbs into your system within 30 minutes of finishing a race, your muscles act like a sponge and can absorb glycogen even better than weeks of pre-race carbo-loading. In the end, this leads to faster regeneration, and a way better recovery.

Maybe I should have eaten a whole lot of pasta last evening, and my legs might have felt better this am? I guess, I will be doing more experimenting! In the meantime-bring on the KD!