I used to think of professional athletes as having the luxury of not needing to go to work every day, so they can just train, but as I have matured and followed more professional athletes, the truth is their training and everything else that goes into their performance is very similar to working a standard 9-5 job. They’re planning out when to do their workouts to optimize the benefit and recovery, while we are planning our workouts to fit them in and give enough recovery before the next session. Just like average people, they have to fit that in around eating enough, sleeping enough, and other obligations that may come up, and then, on top of all of that, things may come up that derail them, just like my Thursday plan this week.
I picked Thursday to talk about, because I think there were some good things and some things I can learn from when it comes to my schedule and optimizing it.
I get started early. Usually around 5:45 AM, and Deagle will whine until I get him after my alarm goes off, so I let him out and then give him breakfast before returning to sit under the fan in my room to cool off while drinking water, because I feel bad most mornings when I get up. This was not my plan that morning, but the cats fought at 2 am, so I did not sleep well and missed my planned 4:30 AM Zwift ride. My first lesson of the day was to keep separating the cats at night until this issue is solved.
By 6:35 I have made breakfast, ordered Starbucks, and have Deagle in the car with me for a quick (1 min) stop to pick up my tea before taking him to daycare for the day. While I work, he can have his exercise. Leaving the house when I do usually gets us to his daycare a little early, so I can drop him off and get to my office around 7:20 and start my workday by 7:30. I am a morning person, so this is ideal for me.
I am trying to lose some body fat right now, which has me getting hungry for a snack around 9 am lately, so I bring an oatmeal square to work and eat that while I’m working. There is also a lot of black tea involved in my day, because they missed the study on women’s productivity and how we’re more productive if the office is a little warmer and our increase in productivity exceeds any decrease in the productivity of men. Someday when I run things I will fix this.
Lunch is where I learned my second lesson on Thursday. We get free lunch at work on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which is great, but sometimes I don’t like the food, because I am a picky eater. This week, with no pescatarian protein option of protein, I ended up having pita bread, a few bites of tomatoes and iceberg lettuce with some sauce, and a brownie, so first it was not remotely nutrient dense, and second it was calorie dense for very little food, while I am trying to lose some fat. I now know I need to start bringing a back-up lunch with me to work on days where there is free lunch, because even though I was able to get enough food, I did not feel very good after that meal.
I managed to leave my office around 3:45, which is a little early. I try to stay until at least 4, but this gave me some extra time in my afternoon. I got Deagle home and had time to ride my bike on the trainer for an hour starting at 4:45, which gave enough time to take Deagle around the neighborhood after dinner and then I went to my personal training session to hit legs. It was a little tough to hit legs right after biking, which is why I wanted to bike in the morning instead of right before my strength workout, but sometimes you have to adapt to things when they don’t go the way you wanted them to.
In that whole day the only time I had to myself was from after my strength workout until I went to bed an hour and a half later, which included time I needed to clean cat litter boxes and to take Deagle out one last time. I say all of this to show how important structure and planning is when it comes to creating a successful training plan.