Hard Training or Burnout?

“Training hard or burned out…which am I?”

You’re putting in a lot of hard miles but getting a little tired and cranky.

You want to train hard so you’re ready for your race but not so hard you get burned out. 

The stakes are high. Your race is on the line, so you don’t want to get it wrong.

How do you tell?

The mistake I see is guessing.

It raises the chance you’ll get it wrong, because you’re likely to guess out of fear.

If you’re most scared of being undertrained you’ll decide you’re being weak and need to suck it up and train harder.

But if you’re most scared of getting burned out, you’ll decide your body needs a break.

Because your guess is based on fear, you go to extremes - either train harder or stop. 

Guessing leaves you burned out or undertrained, neither of which you want.

The reason you’re guessing is because you could be both - you could be training hard AND burned out. It’s not an either-or. So the question you’re trying to answer is impossible. Of course you're guessing.

Let’s change the question to a better one you CAN answer.

And that’s whether your hard training is sustainable or burning you out.

Hard training is ok. You want to train hard to be ready for the race. You just need to know if you're doing it sustainably or not.

There’s a line between the two and you want to train up to the line, not over it.

Think of training like your stove’s temperature. You want to cook dinner at the highest temperature that will cook the food the fastest, without burning it. So you need to know if the temperature is set on sustainable medium or ‘burn dinner’ high.

Similarly, you need a way to tell whether your training is set on ‘sustainable’ or ‘burnout.’

One way I help my clients to do this is to look at how they’re thinking about training - which side of the line is it on?

Sure, training is tough and you’re tired, but are you thinking about training in a way that makes you feel determined, trusting, strong, and eager?

Or trapped, angry, resentful, and apathetic?

For example:

Sustainable: “I’m tired but this hard work is going to be worth it.”

Burnout: “I’m so tired of this I don’t care any more.”

Sustainable: “I’m serious about this race so I make time in my schedule for training.”

Burnout: “I resent the amount of time it takes to train.”

Sustainable: “This training will pay off.”

Burnout: “I’ll never be able to do enough.”

Sustainable: “It’s my top priority until after race day. Then something else can be top priority for a while.”

Burnout: “This has to be my top priority to be a real ultrarunner.”

Sustainable: “I can adjust my training plan when I need to - it’s ok.”

Burnout: “I’m trapped by my training plan - I hate it.”

When you learn how to find which side of the sustainable-burnout line you’re on, the guessing is gone and the next step is easy.

You never have to wonder if you should to keep your training ‘temperature’ the same, or dial it back to stop burnout.

You know.