Just bombed my state race, legs have felt flat, how to fix?

What did you split for the first mile?

What was your volume like compared to the rest of your season? Did you overcook it with intensity in the middle of the season?

ooops, accidental post.

If you dropped off the volume too much at the end, that could leave you feeling flat. If the intensity of your workouts increased a lot at the end, that could do it too.

What has worked for me, when athletes are kind of at the end of their rope is to back things way off and do lots of mini workouts, where nothing is exhaustive. I'll see if I can dig up a thread that I created for one of my girls a number of years ago who ended up 5th at our state meet, use it as an example if you like.

Here's the thread from 11 years ago. It features commentary from a then, relatively unknown Tom 'Tinman' Schwartz (which I had forgotten about).

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2776238

I don't know if this is the best peaking strategy, or strategy for recovering dead legs, but it worked for this girl and it has worked for a number of my other athletes in the past. These days, I'd probably replace the 4 x 1200 @ I pace and 4 minutes recovery with 1200s at CV pace and 1 minute recovery and do a little more to keep the volume up, but otherwise, in retrospect, I've still been using something similar to this pattern for the past 11 years now.

In the initial post of that thread I was refering to my 2003 team, which in hindsight, I 100% overcooked with volume and hard workouts leading up to state

What was your training like 2 weeks before the race? In high school and college I repeatedly came out flat in big races where I backed off too much coming in. I did much better in races where I was maintaining 80-90% volume off regular training with some easier workouts the two weeks leading up. In college and high school I was probably at more like 40% volume the week before and 50-60% two weeks before.

Some people backing off makes you come out flat. Now I'm at 80 miles or so the week leading to a marathon and 90ish the week before that and found I feel much more ready than that where I was at more like 50 or 60 the two weeks before.

CoachB wrote:

ooops, accidental post.

If you dropped off the volume too much at the end, that could leave you feeling flat. If the intensity of your workouts increased a lot at the end, that could do it too.

What has worked for me, when athletes are kind of at the end of their rope is to back things way off and do lots of mini workouts, where nothing is exhaustive. I'll see if I can dig up a thread that I created for one of my girls a number of years ago who ended up 5th at our state meet, use it as an example if you like.

Thanks for the advice. I'll give it a look. Weird thing is, I didn't drop off a lot if at all. I averaged 50-60 mpw from March to the start of September with multiple weeks over 60. From September onward I was rolling 45-50, and my last two full weeks were 46 and 47. This week from Sunday-Friday I'm only at 27 miles so that may have something to do with it.

Hi CoachB, would you follow the same aggressive warm-up, per Tinman, for the 5k distance, as done for the mile or 3200m? Any differences?

The mileage drop over the past week is fine but what did you do for training the last few weeks? Was it different from the rest of the season?

You said you did plenty of strength training? What did you mean by that?

One thing I have observed over the years from athletes at your level is that there are some when things are not going to plan during a race or someone is beating or catching them that they did not expect, or the kid up front is now out of reach they will completely shut down and jog it in.

Not saying this is you for sure but it is either this, something you did in training leading into the race, or health issues.

Sounds like you put too much into the race and it was mental. In your next race, don’t think “I only have a couple races to get a scholarship”.. think “this is just another race that I have an opportunity to try my best, and there will be others after this.”

It might be 10% mental, but it sounds 90% physical. I know what you mean when you say your legs are dead. It’s unavoidable in training, and the only way to bring your legs back around is by backing off the mileage and intensity. I guarantee you’ll be 100% fine for your next few races if you take it easy, no hard workouts and lower mileage. Best of luck!

Also, sometimes it takes a “rust buster,” even if you’ve been racing all season, to get you prepped for a big effort. My guess is you’ll have the race of your life coming up soon. Seriously!

otter wrote:

The mileage drop over the past week is fine but what did you do for training the last few weeks? Was it different from the rest of the season?

You said you did plenty of strength training? What did you mean by that?

One thing I have observed over the years from athletes at your level is that there are some when things are not going to plan during a race or someone is beating or catching them that they did not expect, or the kid up front is now out of reach they will completely shut down and jog it in.

Not saying this is you for sure but it is either this, something you did in training leading into the race, or health issues.

Ok, well looking at my training leading up it was a bit different in terms of workouts:

Oct 24: shorter LR than usual (8.5 miles)

Oct 25: 2x800 2x400 2x200 not super fast but moving the legs

Oct 27: Regional meet (16:33 all alone, didn't feel super great but it wasn't the leg issue, didn't push a lot as I had a big lead)

Oct 28: 11 miles total, not too sure why I thought that was good the day after

Oct 29: 10.2 mile standard LR, although not on the weekend like usual

Oct 30: failed hill workout, this is when I first noticed the issue

Nov 2: successful hill workout

Nov 3: 4x800, 3x200

Nov 7: State meet

Writing it out again, it definitely seems like I panicked after the subpar region meet, and packed more intensity into a shorter amount of time than normal. Seems like I did myself in those 10 days before.

My strength training wasn't anything too intense, I am in a school fitness class where I'm doing just general BW or lighter weigthed exercises with some explosive work as well. I think it has helped me in terms of injury prevention and just feeling stronger in races.

Don't know if I jogged it in, but after he made his move halfway through to pull away, I tried to keep up but my legs just weren't responding. That next mile or so of watching him gap me did me in as I felt I couldn't do much about it. By the last .6 miles I had to try and salvage what I could and make sure 3rd place didn't catch me (which thankfully he didn't).

Looking at this training log from the days leading up, I think you simply dug yourself a hole by running 11, then 10 miles the days after a race effort. For a lower mileage guy, this likely fatigued you enough that your next workout was failed, and then doing another workout fatigued you even more. Again, in my opinion it’s not mental. We as runners know what it’s like to feel good in the legs, and when you don’t have it, there’s nothing you can do to push through it.

frustrated HS wrote:

Oct 24: shorter LR than usual (8.5 miles)

Oct 25: 2x800 2x400 2x200 not super fast but moving the legs

Oct 27: Regional meet (16:33 all alone, didn't feel super great but it wasn't the leg issue, didn't push a lot as I had a big lead)

Oct 28: 11 miles total, not too sure why I thought that was good the day after

Oct 29: 10.2 mile standard LR, although not on the weekend like usual

Oct 30: failed hill workout, this is when I first noticed the issue

Nov 2: successful hill workout

Nov 3: 4x800, 3x200

Nov 7: State meet

What you did coming off the regional meet is certainly a problem, but wouldn't explain everything.

When was the last time you did a tempo run? 1km or mile repeats?

We had a pretty good team in high school that thrived on running a lot in the summer and the longer strength-type workouts we would do in August and September. Our coach was more of a 800 guy, so as soon as we were two weeks out from our conference meet we would hit the track for fast quarters and stuff. We would invariably tail off and our legs would feel increasingly like garbage as the races got more important. As we got older we managed to push back the invariable descent into the toilet bowl and sort of hold it together, but our conference / state performances were never on par with what we did earlier in the year with a heavier training load.

If I were you, I would do the following:

1. take a couple days of jogging just to consolidate after the last couple weeks. Maybe some strides and drills. You won't lose anything.

2. Reintroduce things like threshold work, 800-1km reps at 3km-5km pace, and 1km-2km reps at 5km-10km pace.

3. make sure you are doing all the right things from a recovery standpoint - eating, drinking, sleeping, etc.

Everyone is a different kind of athlete, though.

He didn't say that is how he viewed the state meet. He merely pointed out that he has some more races to put up a good time. He also said nothing about a scholarship.

Yep, you cooked yourself around that regional meet. 10 days is required for full recovery from a SINGLE hard effort; in your case you piled on for two more days and that is all she wrote.

I'm not sure what your next goal race is, but for optimal recovery you should cut way back for a few weeks, just do some strides, easy fartleks and form work. Eat lots of protein and saturated fat, cut the starches and sugar down.

I'm sorry that happened. A similar thing happened to me my senior year. I just didn't have it in the final race and was 45 seconds off the pace...i had my fastest race of high school 2 weeks before the state meet and thought i would be unbeatable by the time the meet came around...but slowly started to realized the power in my legs was gone and i wouldn't come around. I simply didn't peak right that year, and expectations, trying a little too hard in some workouts maybe, calls with college coaches didn't help me deal with the pressure either. I felt absolutely devastated, so try your best to see the positives in your season and know that within a few weeks or months, you'll feel better and bounce back.

You sound like you need to take some time off and start again for track. It really sucks and I know this is not the answer you want to hear, but your legs likely are done for the season. Give them a break. I had an incredible season of track that spring and I think it was partly because of what happened in XC that kept me focused and doing all of the little things to stay sharp.

best of luck to you.

Try taking some down time. Doesn’t have to be a week off. Going for walks or bike rides would be good right now. Also look into getting your iron levels and Ferritin checked.

Just run another race.

Not always things go to plan. Don't worry about it.

Just plan for the next race.

Try taking some down time. Doesn’t have to be a week off. Going for walks or bike rides would be good right now. Also look into getting your iron levels and Ferritin checked. Could also be some anxiety cause by pressure you put on yourself.