cross training!

Some of my favourite runs have been on Christmas Day. I have escaped the warm gift wrap strewn living rooms and twinkle lights to run in the snowy white river valley in Edmonton and to jump the slushy snow banks in Halifax. One year, I enjoyed a fantastically blustery seaside run along the hilly roads of Gabriola Island in British Columbia. There is little traffic on Christmas Day and I love the feeling of being outside alone for a while. It doesn’t feel like training to run on Christmas Day; it feels like a gift.

While the holidays are a joyful and restful break for most people, they can present athletes with restricted training times and an interruption in an otherwise predictable routine. Holidays can be a challenge to training if you are travelling a lot, visiting friends or relatives in a snowy, chilly climate or visiting people in a small town whose only pool is 50km away in another city. Here are some tips to help you enjoy training and the holiday.

1.     The holidays are an obvious time to take a week or two of active rest, or to take an easy week, falling as they do at the end of the season before the start of your next cycle of endurance training. Planning to have a down week is a good way to give yourself a break from having to fit in your training around the schedules of others or pool closures due to Christmas and New Years.

2.     Plan your training ahead as much as possible taking into account that you will have to be flexible. Even if you can do little else, it is realistic to plan a week of only run training. Running is the easiest and most time-efficient of the three sports to fit in, with merely running shoes and the outdoors necessary. A week of running will be enough for maintaining fitness. If you can travel with your bike and stationary trainer and your swim cords, you can easily perform minimal bike and swim maintenance workouts over the holidays.

3.     Gather support. Organize group training with the people that you are with. That way you won’t seem like the only ‘nut’ that wants to go for a run on Christmas Day. Christmas Eve group runs to look at Christmas lights in the neighbourhood can become a tradition, and a Boxing Day  hike for friends and family is healthier than going to the Mall.

4.     If you are doing endurance training in December, organize two heavy weeks of training leading up to the holiday and make the holiday week an easy one. That way you will feel satisfied that you have done good training and can relax and take it easy on your holiday.

5.     You and always arrange to give yourself or to receive new training toys at Christmas and then declare that you have to learn how to use them before you go back to work. This justifies spending 2 hours a day on your Computrainer and swimming laps testing out your Tempo Trainer or new paddles in the pool.

6.     Do advance research on the holiday pool and recreation center schedules in your hometown or where you are visiting and plan your swims ahead as much as possible. (Check to see if they have a treadmill while you are at it). Be prepared to be flexible with your swim training and have workouts printed up and ready if you won’t be swimming with a group. Even if you can’t get in your usual sessions, 20 minutes in the pool doing drills and maintaining feel is better than none.

7.     If you are a parent of young ones who relies on childminding or pre-schools for time to fit in your training, the Christmas season plays havoc with your carefully crafted schedule. Planning for time to yourself is crucial at this time of year. You might have to get up earlier, train at odd hours or ride on the stationary while watching “Dora the Explorer” videos to get your ride in. You might have to choose between last minute Christmas shopping and that 45 minute run. Chances are, if you are an athlete parent, you have already mastered the skills of “creative time management and childcare”; here’s the chance to test out what you have learned.

8.     Be aware of the perils of cross training activities while on Holiday. Triathletes have strong engines and boundless enthusiasm, which allows them to play harder in activities at which they lack the proper conditioning and skills. Playing once-a year pick up hockey with relatives on Christmas Eve is going to leave your sore for at least three days. Even cross country skiing or snow shoeing will leave you aching if you never do it. Plan the duration and intensity of your sessions according to your skill level not your fitness, or plan for a good massage and rest days after.

9.     Eat only when hungry…(good luck!)

With some advance planning, creative time management, and an easy going mindset it is possible to have a fit holiday!