I was going through the recently restored Running Blog Family list of articles published over the last day or so, and found an article over at Boston Dreams and Michelin Stars that dealt with a similar topic as I did when I wrote about how marathon recovery is not instantaneous. Lance Martin wrote about how he keeps his motivation up with two great training tips, the first of which is to take some rest:
One, take some time off. Do it when your healthy, not when injury or illness forces you to the sidelines. I just finished 2 weeks of a self-imposed running moratorium. It was post-marathon, when I would not have been doing any quality running anyway. My risk of injury was high. […] I had no problems “not” working out the first week, when I remained sore from the marathon (and sick). By the second week, however, I was itching to run. But you just have to resist the temptation. Reward the body with rest a little longer, and it will pay dividends down the road.
I agree with him so much that I wrote a completely seperate article about the exact same thing this morning. Funny how that works out.
Lance’s other tip is to go watch a race. I try to make it a point to do that on a semi-regular basis to begin with, because no matter how much I itch to be out there running, I really do love watching it as well. It is a lot easier to say that you will just watch when you are in a taper or recovery period. It makes for a real quick and easy excuse. Around here, though, I could race at least once or twice a week if I wanted to so I take a couple weekends to just go watch a race and to take photographs of the people as they go about their business.
Watching other people race can be a lot of fun. Taking time off can be fun too, as long as you are smart about it and do not get too loopy.
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