The Importance of Finishing What You Start

Whether it is a race, a workout or even just a piece within a workout, I believe that it is really important to finish what you start.  After two World Cup regattas, the biggest SUP race so far this year, and three months of training I’ve seen enough to remind me how extremely important it is to avoid quitting in a race or any part of a workout. 

When I was racing canoe I was extremely competitive and driven and rarely quit in a race, especially in the early stages of my international career.  I must confess that in the late stages of my career, when for the first time I faced a real challenge in domestic races, I quit a couple of times when I fell behind in races and it looked like I wouldn’t win.  I felt like shit immediately after for doing it.  Even to this day, 20 years later, it bothers me when I think about it.  I’m certainly not haunted by it, but when I’m reminded of it or think about those races for some particular reason, it eats at me. 

The most important reason you should never quit is that it is habit forming.  Once you’ve done it the first time it becomes easier to do the second time.  And if you’ve done it a couple of times it becomes a lot more likely you’ll do it again. It doesn’t mater whether it is in a race or a workout. 

I’ve seen talented athletes in both sprint and SUP fall into the trap of quitting in races once they start to face a little adversity.  It’s so easy to do, especially when they’ve already done it once or twice before and a pattern develops.  When you consider that most races, whether they are 1000m sprint races or 12 mile SUP races, are anything but easy and there are lots of moments in races where you have to face challenges, you can see that it can be a constant struggle to keep yourself going if you are weak enough to let the thought of giving in to them cross your mind.  These tough moments taunt you and dare you to keep going.  They tell you it’d just be easier if you quit.  And if you’ve become weak and have succumbed to them once, you’re more likely to do it again.  

The best way to protect yourself from falling victim to these tough moments is to make yourself bulletproof to them by developing the mental strength to keep any negative self-talk during races at bay.  You can practice this by immediately replacing a negative thought with a positive one every time you realize you’re thinking negatively.  I’ve also found it particularly useful to remember that when you’re hurting in a race, or having trouble facing a particular challenge, the people you are racing are hurting just as much and are struggling to face the same challenge as well.  The adversity you feel you are facing is actually not unique to you.  If you consider that, and then challenge yourself to hang on and make the others you’re racing against crack first, you pretty quickly find yourself in the right mindset to paddle right through the tough times.  Fortunately, just like quitting is easier to do the second time, so too is paddling through any adversity.  When you’ve done it really well once and actually realize what you’ve done, it does wonders for your confidence.  You feel like you are unbreakable and mentally strong enough to face anything, and that confidence makes the next time easier. 

To a large extent my experience has shown me that the concept of self-fulfilling prophecies is true in a sport sense.  If you are worried before you start your race about the challenges you’ll face, they are likely to seem like big, difficult challenges for you to overcome when they arise.  What you fear might happen actually tends to happen.  If you have a positive outlook and are full of confidence that you can face any challenges, you are more likely to have less problems dealing with them and everything is more likely to unfold favourably. 

It isn’t just in your races that it is important to never quit, but also in your training.  You should have a training plan and so you should know what your workout is going to be well before you push off the beach and start paddling.  This should allow you to be mentally prepared to deal with the challenges, pain and discomfort you’ll face in the workout.  If you’re mentally ready there should be no excuse for stopping part way though and deciding that you’ll do something easier because your heart isn’t into doing the hard workout you started. 

If you do stop in your training session and either head back to shore or do something easier, you’re doing something that you’ll be more likely to do in the future because you’ve already done it once.  You’ll be surprised how quickly a pattern forms and it suddenly becomes acceptable for you to do something that is certain to prevent you from achieving success.  Let’s face it.  If you are always taking the easy path in training you aren’t going to be very good on race day.   

Even quitting an individual piece in an interval workout is bad.  In my opinion intervals should be done with a similar mental intensity as a race.  While they aren’t often done at physical race intensity, there are always things to concentrate and focus on in a mental sense.  If you practice training with the focus you need in a race then it comes to you naturally when you are actually racing and need that intense focus.  Conversely, if your focus is so weak in training that you let that negative voice in your head get too loud and it convinces you to quit, then you are more likely to quit in a race as well.   

Certainly there are exceptions to the “never quit rule”.  If you suffer an injury it is often foolish to try to go on.  You could be dealing with a protracted period of time away from training if you try to fight through it and make the injury worse than it might have otherwise been.  Inclement weather may be another intelligent reason to quit.  If there is an electrical storm the last place you want to be is on the water.  Or if conditions are getting way beyond your ability it might well be prudent to cut your workout short and head in, or at least find calmer water.  If you limit yourself to quitting only in these exceptional circumstances you should be in no danger of developing any bad habits. 

If I reflect back on my own career, I was at my strongest as a racer when I was my strongest and toughest mentally.  If I reflect back on all the athletes I have seen perform up close, the ones who have done the best most consistently are the ones who have always fought hard in races and respected their training plans no matter what.  They know no other way.   

If you don’t think you are up to a hard workout, or if your heart really isn’t into a race, then you are better off not even getting on your board and trying.  Do something else entirely rather than risk stopping part way though the workout or race.  If you’re not into it you shouldn’t be out there in the first place.  Another thing you can do is cut down your workout before you go out so you won’t have to bail on all or part of it once you’ve started.   At least this way you won’t end up doing something that can quickly form a terrible pattern. 

In my opinion quitting in a race isn’t just harmful to you, it’s also disrespectful to your fellow competitors and to sport in general.  The essence of sport is to try your best.  When you don’t you not only cheat yourself, you also cheat the other athletes who were looking forward to racing you.  And if you’re in an event for which you had to qualify, you’re cheating the athlete who just missed qualifying and would have given anything to have a chance to race hard in that race.   

So this week’s Tip of the Week is simple.  Finish what you start. 

Polarize your Training Program

In the “Training for SUP” series of blog posts I did a while back I outlined the importance of having a periodized training program.  If you are going to get maximal benefit out of the time you spend training and perform at a high level then it is imperative to periodize your training according to some coherent plan.  But in tandem with that it is becoming increasingly evident that a polarized training program as part of the periodized plan is the most effective training to achieve performance gains.

There are a few different approaches to training that athletes (and coaches writing programs for athletes) in endurance sports can take. To summarize they are:

1.      High Volume Training (HVT):  This is training performed at low intensity for long periods of time such as long, steady paddles or long intervals with low amounts of rest (high work to rest ratio).  This is the type of training that is traditionally done when developing an aerobic base early in the paddling season.

2.      Threshold Training (THRT):  This is training where the majority of the work is done at or close to anaerobic threshold.  Anaerobic threshold is the point where the body can no longer meet the working muscles’ demands for oxygen and the muscles must turn to anaerobic energy systems to make the ATP necessary to sustain muscle contractions.  It has always been believed that by working close to threshold it is possible to raise the threshold, thus allowing an athlete to continue to work aerobically at a higher level of performance.

3.      High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT):  This is training in which the main focus is completion of work done above anaerobic threshold.  Of course since it is so demanding and uses primarily anaerobic energy systems it is performed for shorter periods of time so intervals look more like 10 x 1 to 2 minutes with 2 minutes of more of rest.  This work isn’t performed every day, but forms the backbone of the training program based on HIIT.

4.      Polarized Training (POLT):  This is training based on a combination of HVT and HIIT, according to an 80% HVT to 20% HIIT ratio.  There is virtually no, or at least minimal, time spent doing THRT.  The theory behind this is that physiological adaptations that support increased aerobic capacity can be developed effectively at lower intensities while the stimulus for greatest performance gains comes from maximal efforts.  While doing low intensity work between HIIT workouts has a beneficial training effect, it also ensures that the athlete is sufficiently rested and prepared to perform at a true maximal effort in the high intensity sessions.  The theory also suggests that repeated training close to threshold in THRT has a cumulative fatiguing effect that diminishes the athlete’s ability to perform at that true maximal effort in the HIIT sessions, thus preventing the athlete from getting the necessary stimulus required to achieve maximal gains.

There have been numerous studies performed in recent years with athletes training for 9 to 12 week blocks on programs based on each of the above approaches.  Some of the studies have been crossover studies in which the athletes switch from one training approach to another at the end of each training block.  This allows for an even better comparison of the effects of each type of training philosophy.

In each of the studies the group training on a polarized program has had the best performance gains.  In one study (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3912323/) the polarized training group had VO2 max gains of 1.7%, time to exhaustion gains of 17.4%, and peak velocity and power gains of 5.1%.  Interestingly, the peak velocity/power at anaerobic threshold increased by 8.1% even though the participants in the polarized program never trained at threshold!  The groups based on HIIT and HVT training achieved substantially less improvement, and the THRT group showed no notable changes in physiology or performance. 

What are the implications of this for SUP paddlers?  If you are an experienced trainer with a good level of fitness and training daily, you’ll stand to gain more from polarizing your program than you will if you don’t.  If you’re new to paddling or not really very fit to start with, you’ll probably get very good gains just performing high volume training, however as you get fitter and more experienced then you’ll probably want to add in enough HIIT to make your program polarized. 

If you’re only training a couple of days a week, I’d still suggest some type of polarized approach, for example I’d suggest on a three days/week schedule doing two HVT sessions and one HIIT session. 

Over the last few seasons I was finding that my training was excellent early in the year but I felt the effectiveness tapered off the deeper into the paddling season I got.  I believe this was attributable to a couple of things.  First, I think I could have done a better job of maintaining strength through the paddling season.  You’ve heard me say before that SUP paddling requires a lot of strength simply because of the shape of the board and the amount of paddle shaft beneath your bottom hand.  Early in the season I had lots of strength to apply to my paddling after a winter of effective strength training.  But as the season progressed I felt my strength diminished, and with it my ability to move my board as effectively.  To remedy this I have been much more diligent so far this year doing quality work in the gym to maintain strength and power, even if it means I am spending time in the gym at the expense of time on the water a couple of times a week.

I believe the second thing that contributed to less effective training the deeper I got into the paddling season was doing too much threshold and/or high intensity work.  I have a pretty good training group at home in the summer and also we have had some weeks in which we have lots of good downwind conditions.  In our group training we often get quite competitive and in downwind sessions it frequently turns into an informal race.  While the key to successful downwinding is to relax and rest as much as possible, if you’re trying to link waves and even jump waves you’re doing a lot of short, intense sprints.  It’s HIIT training and you can’t do it everyday without eventually dealing with significant cumulative fatigue.  I believe the result of training at threshold too frequently on the flats and doing high intensity intervals so much was that eventually I felt flat and somewhat run down, and then I couldn’t properly perform the high intensity work that provides the best stimulus for improvement.

This year I’ve made a concerted effort to polarize my training and have used a heart rate monitor regularly to ensure that I stay within the proper training zone and am not training too close to threshold.  This training has still allowed me to experience the adaptations at the level of the muscle fiber that result in improved aerobic performance without getting too fatigued and having a negative impact on my ability to do high intensity work.  My level of performance has been very high (I recently completed the Graveyard at the Carolina Cup seven minutes faster then my previous best) while at the same time I have felt less cumulative fatigue and seem to have better command of my technique on a daily basis.  So far, the polarized approach to training has proven quite effective for me.

I’d like to make it perfectly clear that I am not advocating dropping threshold training from your program entirely.  I usually end up doing one session per week at threshold and will probably continue that.  There are lots of reasons why I think threshold training makes sense for a SUP paddler.  Some of those have to do with pacing and technique, as you can only really develop mastery of them at threshold pace by actually doing that training.  And let’s face it, there are going to be important chunks of our races in this sport that are performed at or close to threshold.  Make no mistake.  Threshold training is not bad for you.  The take home for anyone reading this should be that threshold training performed too frequently in a training program is not going to lead to performance improvements.  In fact in a worst-case scenario it might lead to over reaching in training or even a state of over training.  At best you’ll just be working incredibly hard for little or no likelihood of improved performance.

In contrast, setting your program to a balance of approximately 80% volume training and 20% high intensity training will increase your chances of seeing notable performance improvements and diminish the risk of over training.  Adding in a threshold training workout into that 80:20 ratio isn’t going to hurt, but I’d suggest it be well spaced out from the high intensity work you do. 

There’s no one program that works ideally for everyone.  We’re all individuals and we all have different strengths and weaknesses.  The idea is to experiment with your program and find out what structure works best for you.  You can start by reflecting on the structure of your current program.  If you’re not doing one or two high intensity interval type workouts per week you can add them.  They’re hard but they’re fun.  If you’re hammering all the time close to threshold, understand that it’s okay to go slower regularly in your training.  You’ll actually improve.  And while you shouldn’t ever be afraid of training at threshold, if you’re doing it all the time it’s a problem.  Have fun!

Keep the Results of Your Races in Perspective

Given that a few weeks ago we were at the biggest SUP race of the season at the Carolina Cup, that the ISA World Championships are this week, and that the summer racing season is almost upon us it seems like an appropriate time to take a look at dealing with race results and keeping them in perspective.

I think we all need to be reminded from time to time that paddling is supposed to be fun.  If we’re training to race, no matter what the level, we of course want to do well and are happy when we do and disappointed when we don’t.  But the race results should be only a very small part of the list of reasons we have for paddling.  My hero when I was a kid just starting to paddle, 1976 Olympic silver medalist John Wood, said, “What I like most about racing is winning, but that’s not what I like most about paddling.”

There are so many great things about paddling that don’t have anything to do with winning, or doing well, in a race.  We’re outdoors getting exercise, we’re on the water, we get to paddle in places that are beautiful, and we get to do it with like-minded people.  And what about the feeling of the connection with the water or of your board taking off and gliding on a bump?  These are magical feelings that only paddlers understand, but these are the things that keep bringing me back to my board.  They’re also what I miss most when I can’t, for whatever reason, paddle for a few days.Racing is a very small part of SUP paddling, even for the most serious racers.  Yet understandably, we all have goals and when we work really hard to achieve them we want to reach them successfully.  We’re excited when we do and we’re disappointed when we don’t.  That’s natural.  What is a problem is when we get the importance of our results way out of perspective and get too high when we’ve raced well and too low when we haven’t.  

I can remember the first time I lost a race domestically after I had starting winning C1 in Canada.  I had been the best in the country for 6 years and already won two Olympic medals.  I was racing at the May set of National Team Selection Trials in 1986 and lost the C1 1000m.  I can’t remember the exact details of the race but it went down something like I didn’t take it seriously enough and missed Dave Frost catching up and passing me on the inside.  By the time I realized what was happening it was too late to catch him and I finished second.  I should have been able to recognize what happened, learn a quick lesson from it and get my act together for racing the next day, but instead I let it rattle me and shake my confidence.  A day later Dave went out and plain and simple kicked my ass in the C1 500m.

I was devastated and when I got home from Montreal I was a wreck and actually broke down.   It seemed like my entire identity had been taken from me.  Fortunately, as much as I had over-reacted after the first loss and let it get to me causing the second, I was able to put things in proper perspective within a couple of days.  I remembered why I paddled in the first place – because I loved it and it was fun, not because I had to win.  I reminded myself that there were lots of guys all trying to win and that I was just one of them – I had no right to feel entitled somehow to win.  I promised myself that I would bounce back with renewed determination and focus, embrace the challenge of reasserting myself in future races, and place less importance on the results going forward and more on the quality of the effort I was able to make in each race.

I learned from that experience and had lots of great races in years that followed until I retired in 1996.  I had bitter disappointments like finishing 4^th in the C1 1000m at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul and missing the Olympics in 1996, but managed to keep my head held high as long as I had done everything I could in my race.  I tried hard to stay on an even keel whether I had won or lost, raced well or poorly.  I promised myself that I’d learn everything I could from each performance and then move on.   At the end of the day the race is just a race.  Rarely do the results change your life forever.  And sport, though at times we take it so seriously, is just a game.  It’s not life and death.

We’ve all seen athletes who win more than they lose.  There’s a couple in SUP that jump to mind.  Danny Ching, who just pulled out an incredible victory in the ISA Worlds and Annabel Anderson, who recently just won her third straight Carolina Cup after having won just about everything else in the sport.  Most of us have no idea how hard it is for them to race and continually have to live up to the expectations we all have of them, let alone the expectations they have for themselves.  Winning so regularly you sometimes feel you have nothing to gain from entering another race and everything to lose.  You always feel everyone is trying to beat you (and they are) and often you have to deal with people on shore cheering for the underdog, meaning they’re cheering against you.

I figure the only way these two great athletes can deal with all of that is to keep it fun and remember what they loved about paddling in the first place.  They’ve got things in perspective and understand that anyone can win in sport.  Sure they want to win every time out, but it doesn’t always work out.  They don’t let the odd loss affect them.  When they do lose they learn from the experience and bounce right back.  And in my eyes someone like Danny Ching actually enhances his stature as a champion when, like at this year’s Carolina Cup, he’s graceful in defeat.

As I described in last week’s Tip of the Week, it’s important to not let things beyond your control stress you out.  What other athletes do in their race is certainly something that is beyond your control.  They want to win too and sometimes they just race better.  No matter what you do you can’t control that.  What you can control are your own emotions and your own attitudes that you bring to your race.  You control the level of focus you bring to each event and as such you control the quality of your race.  You can’t control someone else’s.  If you’ve put together the best race you possibly can how can you be disappointed, even if someone puts together a better one?  It’s essential to remember this when we’re talking about keeping winning and losing in perspective.

I’ve always found that my performance actually improves if I don’t concern myself too much with the other racers and forget about the results.  I’ve found if I just focus on the process of paddling well and not where I might finish, the results end up taking care of themselves and I more often than not have a great race.

It’s not just important to keep your race results in perspective, but also your training.  That’s a whole other discussion which I will save for a future Tip of the Week, but for now it’s enough to say you don’t ever want to fall into the trap of always having to be better than you were the workout before.  In the end you’ll only end up burned out and disappointed.

In every race there are races within the race.  Even if you’re not winning the overall race, you’re usually in a tough battle with someone you have a rivalry with or have been training to beat.  Or maybe you’re not racing the elite race but the rec race instead and are striving to win that.  At whatever level you’re racing you should never apologize for being competitive.  I can still remember my first coach telling me, “Do everything humanly possible in your race to win, and if you can’t win than fight to come second.  If you can’t come second then scratch and claw to come third, and if you can’t come third then fight to come fourth.”  I stand by that.  It is the essence of racing.  But when the race is over, it’s important to understand the essence of sport.  Not everyone wins and nobody wins every time.  There’s no shame in losing if you’ve done your best and competed with honor.  It’s okay to be disappointed with a loss, but if you want to be good the next time out you need to understand it’s just one race.  It shouldn’t shake your confidence or diminish your sense of worth as an athlete or human being.  Go congratulate the winner and then learn what you can from it and move on.  Then go and make your next race better.

Don’t Waste Time and Energy Worrying about Things Beyond Your Control

Shit happens.  I was reminded of this on the weekend when I was driving home from the National Team Trials on the 1996 Olympic course in Gainesville, Ga.  My drive was going well - I was making great time, wasn’t getting sleepy, as usual was getting incredible mileage in my VW Golf TDI wagon and had found lots of engaging stuff on the satellite radio.  I was running over plans for Monday in my mind:  breakfast at home, take the dogs to the dog park, have a nice nap, then put my board in the water and go for an easy paddle on my home waters. 

Suddenly, at about 6 a.m., things started to go wrong.  My car lost power and was limping along, not responding to any pressure on the gas pedal.  The check engine light came on and the glow plug light started flashing.  I consulted the manual.  I was in “limp mode”, designed to help you get to a service center while keeping engine revs low so as not to damage the engine.  I limped along for a short while, staying in the right lane on the interstate going downhill and on the shoulder with flashers on going uphill, trying to get to a VW service center.  A short time later my car lost all power and I found myself on the side of 1-79, about 25 km south of Erie, Pa. 

The rest is a bit of a blur.  I called roadside assistance and they arranged a tow to a dealer in Erie.  I checked in with the service department and then sat around waiting for Chris Lightboud to come down to Erie to pick up me, my board and all the junk in my car. What a great friend to do that.  I looked through the various VW and TDI forums on the Internet.  It’s a lot like checking Web MD to see what medical condition the symptoms you’re suffering from might indicate.  It makes your mind race.  I was bummed.  My plans for the day were shot and now I was facing the uncertainty of not having my car and dealing with the repairs.  Would VW honor the warranty?  Was it a mechanical failure or did the last station I filled up at in Fort Chiswell, Va have contaminated diesel?  The service department at the dealer was short staffed and wasn’t going to be able to look at the car for a few days.  There was lots of uncertainty and lots I could get stressed about.

Chris eventually arrived to pick me up, we got my board and all my stuff loaded up and headed home.  We talked about the Carolina Cup, the Trials and whatever else came to mind and before I knew it the 2 ½ hour trip was over and I was home.  It was 4:30 pm and I got my quality dog time in, got to relax a little and had a nice dinner.  And I made sure I got any signs of frustration and stress under control.

One thing I learned as a National Team paddler back in the early ‘80s is that there’s no point in worrying about things beyond your control.  When we were travelling all over Europe, and all over the old Communist East Bloc, things always seemed to crop up that ruined, or at least changed, our plans.  Hours spent waiting in customs, showing up to train before a regatta and not having boats for a couple of days, horrible food, drunk Russian coaches making noise all night in the room next to yours through paper thing walls, etc.  All of these are examples of things that can conspire to affect your performance. They certainly are not ideal scenarios to deal with while you’re preparing to race at a World Cup the next morning or in a few days. 

Interestingly enough, however, I learned through experience that these types of things only seemed to affect me as much as I let them.  I discovered if I just shut my mind off and didn’t worry about things that were far beyond my control, the actual impact of any of these things was minimal and even non-existent.  I had some great races under some trying circumstances.  I observed other members of the team or other athletes from other countries deal with similar circumstances.  There was a pattern.  Those that got stressed about things beyond their control – anything from noisy neighbors in the hotel to unfair winds on the course – tended to race poorly.  Those that seemed unaffected by these external things tended to race really well.  Sure, unfair conditions might affect their performance, but they always seemed to do far better in them than anyone expected they would. 

It’s pretty clear.  A certain amount of stress helps you perform better.  Too much impacts your performance negatively.  You’ll find lots of books in the self help section that describe how stress affects performance and offer suggestions on how to deal with that stress.  Moreover you’ll also find lots of information on how stress affects your health.  It’s not good. 

Letting stressors just roll off you like water off a duck’s back is easier said than done.  It’s not easy, and some things that stress you are a lot harder to ignore than others.  But in general, most of the things that stress us probably shouldn’t.  It’s worth asking yourself, “What can I do to change the situation?”  If the answer is nothing, that the situation is totally beyond your control, why are you worried about it?  Can you do anything when your flight is delayed?  Sure, it’s a pain in the ass and means you’ll likely miss your connection, but is it the end of the world?  You’ll find you’ll feel a lot better if you just let it go and go with the flow rather than get mad or worried about it.  And if you’re on your way to a race, I guarantee you’ll have a lot more energy for your race when you finally get there if you just shut your brain off and go with the flow. 

Why do we worry about the race conditions if we can’t control them?  All we can do is our best.  Even if the conditions are really challenging for you, you’ll do a lot better if you don’t worry about them and just do your best.  You’ll be more relaxed and alert and able to respond more quickly and decisively when you need to.  If you’re worried and stressed you’ll be tight and you’ll struggle.  I’ve seen athletes literally paralyzed by stress when they’re racing.  Their races turn into disasters that really were avoidable if they’d just managed to deal with their stress levels more effectively.

Everyone has their own way of keeping things in perspective and dealing with stress.  We’re all different so you have to find a way that works for you.  However one principle is going to be useful for everybody – don’t waste your time and energy worrying about things you have no control over.  What’s going to happen is going to happen.  Accept it.  Stay calm, relaxed and confident.  Don’t let it ruin your day.  What’s the worst thing that can happen?  The situation you’re dealing with is likely so far from that it’s insignificant in comparison.  If you can manage to become better at this I’m certain you’ll find your race weekends will be more fun and your performances better.  You’ll probably also be healthier in the long run as well.

I have no idea what is going to happen with my car.  Apparently it was in the shop today but I still haven’t heard what the problem is.  I have no idea whether it is a minor or major repair and whether it will be covered by warranty or not.  It’s all complicated by the fact that I leave for Europe on Sunday, and there is a very real chance that repairs won’t be finished by then.  It’s a hassle, but it could be worse.  I’m not letting it ruin my day.  When I find out what the problem is I’ll deal with it.  It’s beyond my control.  Why worry about it now?

Take Advantage Of Unique Opportunities Provided By Your Training Environment

I’ve been traveling a lot this spring for my coaching job with the National Canoe Kayak Team and fortunately that means I’ve been in some pretty good places for SUP training. 

Indian Harbour Beach, Florida provided miles of excellent paddling water-sheltered canals, the Banana and Indian Rivers (which can get very windy with surprisingly large choppy waves) and of course, just a kilometer away, the ocean.  This meant that for eight weeks I had access to every type of condition that I would see in the Carolina Cup.  It was the perfect training environment and I did my best to take full advantage of everything it had to offer.

This week I find myself in Gainesville, Georgia.  Our team is here racing on the 1996 Olympic course on Lake Lanier in selections for world cup races in Portugal, Germany and Denmark throughout May.  As a venue for flat water training and racing it is ideal, but at first glance it isn’t the ideal place to develop advanced SUP skills.  Or is it?

Obviously I have no access to the ocean here so there is no opportunity to work on beach starts (mine need work) or downwinding or surfing.  Lake Lanier is an ideal place to do flat water workouts, either long steady workouts covering great distances (the lake goes on forever) or some type of structured interval training.  I’ve already done a couple of these workouts this week, and they hurt a bit given that last weekend’s Carolina Cup seems to still be in my muscles.

Yesterday I was looking for something different to do and it seemed like my options were limited until I decided to use the canoe-kayak racecourse.  There’s nothing exciting about these courses for me as I’ve paddled on them all my life.  But I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to paddle on the course in an entirely different way that’s possible only on a SUP. 

Canoe-kayak/rowing courses are laid out on flat water over 2000m.  Canoe-kayak uses the bottom 1000m while rowing uses the entire 2000m.  The canoe course is divided into nine lanes, each nine meters wide. When the rowers use the course it is changed to six wider lanes.  Buoys that are strung along cables that run the length of the course underwater mark the lanes, and at the Lake Lanier course they are ten meters apart.  That means that on the 1000m canoe course there are 100 buoys on either side of the lane you paddle down.  The photo below, though it is actually of the London 2012 Olympic course, does a pretty good job of illustrating this.  You can actually see the narrow canoe lanes in the bottom half and the wider rowing lanes at the top of the course. 

What better place to work on buoy turns than on a regatta course with so many buoys?  I structured my workout around one lane of the course and zigzagged up the lane, doing a right shoulder turn around the first buoy on the left of the lane and a left shoulder turn around the next buoy on the right, then going back to another right shoulder turn around the buoy after that on the left side.  Weaving around the buoys on either side of one lane in this fashion meant I did 50 buoy turns in each direction over the 1000m course.   I only did three sets of this and found it was plenty, and then went on to do some extra steady paddling.
 
Obviously, doing buoy turns involves walking back and forth on my board and doing so many turns on such a tight course meant that I felt my legs burning pretty quickly.  I also found that accelerating the board out of every turn mean that I was working really hard, constantly having to restart a board which had slowed in the turn.  While the distance between buoys was quite short and prevented me from attaining full speed between buoys, I still found that it was quite hard work aerobically and quickly I was working close to threshold. 

The first two 1000m pieces were pretty solid and I was really pleased with the quality of my turns and my ability to quickly get up to speed out of them.  The last one was a little messier as my legs were like jello.  I felt my feet a little less coordinated underneath me, and my paddling a little weaker.  Still, I did more tight turns in a short time that in any workout I’ve ever done in my life.

I think this is a pretty good example of taking advantage of unique opportunities that your training environment may provide you.  I can paddle on flat water anytime at home, but don’t often have a chance to paddle on a canoe kayak course anymore, especially on a SUP.  When presented with the opportunity I took advantage of it and found a way to work on skills that are a big part of racing. in the same way that I would by doing extra beach starts when I am training at or near a beach.

Unique opportunities for training can arise from the physical environment you’re training in as well as from the people you have an opportunity to paddle with.  I strongly suggest taking stock of the environment that you are training in, in an effort to see exactly what it has to offer.  A smart racer will identify unique opportunities to work on specific skills needed for racing, or will use the others training in that environment to push him/her to a higher level.  A smart racer will also learn from those other paddlers, particularly if they are strong in areas that the racer is weak in. 

It’s fun and mentally healthy to train in different environments from time to time.  It’s a great way to mentally recharge and refocus, and can be a great way to develop and perfect skills if you take the time to fully identify what your new training environment has to offer.  Take a careful look around you.  Are you using your training environment as well as you can?