effect of not racing for a year

local road races would be racing

heyguy wrote:

local road races would be racing

Yes, but certainly not at the same level that I would train and race on a collegiate team for track, at least I don't think so.

Has anyone had to lay off collegiate racing for a year but continued to run and gone on to have a successful college running career? I've seen high level high school runners who have missed a season for injury and who never seem to come back to their former high level - I'd like to take this time off from racing but don't want to lose my edge. What about the LDS guys who take off for their missions?

run the fastest races in your area, travel to a few half marathons/10 milers or something, use direct athletics and compete in some open meets

focus on what you're going to do to get faster and pr in your time off from your team, not why you can't get faster

I'm a guy who's college didn't have track, but every year I'd lower my 5, 10, and half marathon times in the spring and my xc times in the fall. There are no excuses.

Cool, that's what I wanted to hear. I don't want to make excuses either, just don't want to lose what it's taken me years to build up. I kept a pretty good running diary during my last few years of high school and my coach had workouts and runs that seemed to work for me, so I thought maybe I could just use that as a guide and, if possible, run some of the local races like you suggest. Thanks.

I had some injury troubles my freshmen year of college so I wasn't able to compete. My sophomore year of college I tried out for the track team and was able to run a faster indoor mile than I had at state track my senior year of high school.

When I wasn't injured my training was pretty substantial though and I do around seven road races every summer.