Training provides the stimulus. Recovery provides the adaptation. When recovery is whatever is left over after work, family and training, progress becomes unpredictable and the same programme starts to feel harder than it did a month ago.
For most of the people I coach in Reigate, the limiting factor is not the training session. It is sleep that is routinely short, weeks with no genuine downshift, and stress that never quite clears.
Where to start
- Fix the hour you go to bed first, and leave every other sleep tweak until that one holds.
- Give the week at least one deliberately lighter day.
- Notice which recurring commitments always cost you recovery, and decide whether they stay.
- Walk. A steady half hour on the Downs or around Priory Park does more for recovery than most people expect.
Recovery is also an environment question. If your surroundings and your schedule make rest difficult, willpower is being asked to do a job that design should be doing.
- Design
- Mindset