[Trackcolo]

Trackcolo on February 5, 2008 at 1:20 am #14318

I weighed myself and found that I am running 11 pounds over my normal running weight. My body fat has increased slightly as well. My training has been alot of longer sprints with little speed work. I was training in early september and october, then for personal reasons took off until January.

now my question is.. I had my frist college meet this weekend and ran my slowest EVER 200. My 55 was also fairly slow. Could this be because my body is still adjusting to the training? (High school track was based on alot more rest than what I am doing now) Could it be the gained weight? (I went from 147 w 9.2¿ to 158 w 9.84¿).. Or could it just be that it is early in the season?

[Chad Williams]

Chad Williams on February 5, 2008 at 2:11 am #68307

Two months off has pretty much reset your system to your natural fitness level. Give it time.

[Mike Young]

Mike Young on February 5, 2008 at 10:04 am #68312

Newton’s 4th Law: Fat don’t fly.

Lose the weight and run faster.

ELITETRACK Founder

[TrackCoach]

TrackCoach on February 5, 2008 at 7:15 pm #68314

This sort of begs the question of “How long can you be away from training before you loose what you’ve built?” Of course the answer depends on how much and how it has been built in the first place. A standard periodization scheme builds in a recovery period of a few weeks, so how long is too long to lay off before the effects of training noticeably decline?

[mortac8]

mortac8 on February 5, 2008 at 7:21 pm #68315

Ha….are you on my team? Seriously you can’t train for 6 weeks then take 2 months off, gain 11lbs and expect to be straight. I have a girl who pretty much did that and went from running 7.70 to 8…. another who went abroad for 5 months, did nothing and now long jump is -2feet.

You can take a month or two off if you’ve been training hard for the prior 10 months otherwise it can be quite detrimental especially in the short term. Like CW said, you just have to train consistently now and have patience.

[madisonflash]

madisonflash on February 6, 2008 at 1:03 am #68316

I thought you said they now had a 2 ft long jump until I reread.

As for the original question, I doubt it is really the weight that’s holding you up – I added almost 20# during college and got faster in the 200 and 400 – it all depends on your frame and how much strength you can add without becoming bulky or musclebound. If you’re 6’0″, you can definately carry more than 147# without it being any problem.

Also, I don’t know where you ran in HS, but if you only ran outside, the transition to indoors can be deceiving. Your 200 will be slower than you think, due to the sharper turns.

Last point, regarding taking time off – we had guys leave the country for the month of January (we had a J-term) then try to come back for the end of indoor. It never worked well, and it always took until outdoors rolled around for them to really be back in race-shape.

Be patient. College track is a long season compared to HS.