Holidays can be a tricky time for athletes. Parties, travel, changes in routine, and…parties make it hard to stay on track. The coaches at Wahoo Sports Science share their top tips for navigating the holiday season so you can make 2022 your best year yet.
Holidays can be a tricky time for athletes. Parties, travel, changes in routine, and…parties make it hard to stay on track. The coaches at Wahoo Sports Science share their top tips for navigating the holiday season. From how to maintain your fitness to the benefits of recovery. You’ll learn how to not just survive but thrive during the holidays so you can make 2022 your best year yet.
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Neal Henderson 0:00
Hello, and welcome back to another episode of The Knowledge Podcast brought to you by Wahoo. I'm Neal Henderson, head of Wahoo sports science.
Mac Cassin 0:07
And I'm at Cassin senior sports scientist with Wahoo. Today we're talking about surviving the holidays, not actual life or death stuff, but how to ensure your training and fitness survive the holidays.
Neal Henderson 0:17
Alright, Mac, I think the holidays definitely are different for everyone. It's not something that it's just like, everyone has the exact same experience.
Mac Cassin 0:25
Yeah, definitely. Some people get a lot of energy and enjoy spending time with their family and other people, maybe not so much. And it's especially now where people are traveling more with COVID stuff kinda. It's been an interesting couple of years, basically. So chances are, you're going to be seeing more people this holiday season than last holiday season.
Neal Henderson 0:44
Definitely. It's not just a scene family. It's the travel, it's the events, things that are going on, and just disruption generally, and what your normal schedule looks like. That's one of the biggest things that we're trying to manage during the holidays of all these disruptions and changes to your normal routine.
Mac Cassin 1:03
Yeah. And like you said, I think the big point here is that disruption to your normal routine, and that's something that can get if you're really good about your training, and structured can be stressful to deviate from that to start doing stuff that you normally don't do, which, yeah, it can be trickier. But at the same time, you want to make sure that you enjoy these this time of the year, definitely.
Neal Henderson 1:21
So in some ways, most people are going to find that they train a little bit less than they normally would during the holiday period. And often you're going to have richer holiday dishes and drinks that maybe aren't part of your typical year-round training diet. So a couple of other things to think about thereon on the food and drink side of things. Okay.
Mac Cassin 1:43
Yeah. And that's as much as we would love to tell have turkey and ham and all that good stuff year-round and lots of adult beverages. Chances are if you're serious about your training, that's not exactly your go-to, it can be hard to cause some situations you're in if you're, I don't say the black sheep, but if your family or friends, if you're the weird fitness not who might get a bit more grief from their relatives or friends, it can be tricky to stick with eating a bit healthier, drinking a bit less. I know my dad, what his trick would be every Christmas Eve, we'd go over to a family friend's house and most people would be drinking quite a bit. And his go-to was to just have a beer like in a regular bottle. And then basically for the rest of the night, just refill that bottle with water. And so he was able to look and play the part of being festive and enjoying it. But keep the total consumption down to a more reasonable level
Neal Henderson 2:33
And can still be enjoying it that way too.
Mac Cassin 2:35
Yes, absolutely.
Neal Henderson 2:36
Not that he took away having fun. Just made himself probably feel a little bit better the next day, not having too much.
Mac Cassin 2:43
Yes, I think he was definitely the Spry just on most Christmas mornings.
Neal Henderson 2:46
Yeah, most dads have a lot of things to do the night before holidays, and they got to get a lot of stuff done. And that magic doesn't happen by itself. So right if you need all your faculties, fully raring to go to get it done, I can tell you from
Mac Cassin 2:59
Well, isn't that what Santas for Neil doesn't he'd do the heavy lifting there.
Neal Henderson 3:02
And some elves and all kinds of there's all kinds of stuff out there that that happens at the holiday time. That is just magic. From my perspective, I always tend to think about the holidays, as a time that we're trying to just maintain what we've got not necessarily a time that we're really trying to gain a lot of fitness. And that's, I know, hard. Most of us are motivated, we want to be getting better where we're by that as we train and get and do workouts and accomplish things that we're capable of doing more. But there are times where we just kind of need to pull it back a little bit and put that kind of goal sometimes second or third tier on things fourth-tier overall and manage ourselves and what our normal kind of drive is in that way. So for me, it's about a little bit of a shift in mindset. And when I do that, it really helps minimize that additional stress that changing your routine can cause and so inevitably, you're going to have some missed workouts, you're going to do less than you planned, in some cases, a shorter workout, you may eat or drink a little bit more than you intended and not feel exactly the same as you normally would when you wake up. So for me, it's about okay, giving that bit of permission and changing that mindset, and getting done a little bit of what you can. And as a coach. That's one of the things that I talk about with athletes as well that I have worked with, it's you got to give yourself some permission to enjoy the holidays and not stress out over some of the changes to your schedule and your plan. And so that's, for me probably the most important way of how I approach the holidays and be able to continue to move through it while still maybe not making big gains in fitness and performance but not letting it completely derail everything that you've done as well as then allowing you to be able to get back into things as soon as those holiday time periods.
Mac Cassin 4:53
Yeah, I think a bit of to that point. A bit of planning can go a really long way here. If you have commitments, whatever family gatherings, that you're going to your schedule are going to be a bit thrown off, it can really help you feel like you're maintaining a lot more control, if you do just lookout and maybe map more specifically what you're going to do during those holiday weeks, and maybe on days, you normally would have an off day, maybe you actually do some training that day, and then take one of those holiday days just completely off again, you can get into the routine of Saturday, Sunday, or longer days or whatever. But a week is just a bunch of days, it doesn't have to be that rigid that every Saturday you have to X amount of hours every Sunday, you can be flexible. And taking that time to plan and prep a little bit to shift your training around can definitely make that those changes to your normal rhythm are easier to handle, because you still, at that point, have a sense of control, and you're still the architect of your training destiny.
Neal Henderson 5:44
Yeah, in an ideal world, if you've ramped up your training a little bit before, say a week or so where you have lots of events or travel or family in town, that way you've gotten a lot of work done, you pull back, you do a lot less, and you're able to enjoy that time not feeling like you're missing out on something, that's definitely a good way of approaching it. Another way to do that would be to do some things that you don't normally do, you might not consider going out for a walk necessarily the same kind of training load is going out for a several-hour-long ride. But if you do that with family, you get out and might be encouraging somebody to do some more activity than they normally would do. And you're going to definitely be a lot better than if you didn't go out and do that walk. So being able to have that time to connect with family with friends and get outside and move. Definitely a good idea.
Mac Cassin 6:35
Yeah, and even expanding on that doesn't even have to be necessarily that out super active stuff. You can do some of your, what we call to like your recovery work with them. For me and my wife, what we'll do when we're traveling together for holidays is we'll do yoga together. Like normally during the week, we probably should do it more often. But we really don't. But when we are traveling, and neither of us has our normal routine of working out or something, then yeah, we will spend that time together doing yoga, we feel good, productive, that we're doing something good for our bodies. And yeah, having that time together is it's just, it's nice. It's a stress-free way to make sure you're getting good quality time with people.
Neal Henderson 7:09
Definitely. And so in some respects, a little something is always better than nothing. So even though Yeah, maybe normally, you might want to spend half an hour on a session, if you just do 15 minutes, you got 15 more minutes done than you would otherwise. So it's not all or nothing, I think is one thing to keep in mind that it's not you maintain your training schedule with 100% rigidity, or you have nothing at all, there's clearly lots of room to do a little bit here a little bit there and just get something for me, I always say something is better than nothing. There are days where I've done a five-minute session on I had originally planned in most cases to do say a 30-minute session. And whatever happens, it just things that pop up little things that need to be addressed. And all of a sudden, it's like I have five minutes. And in some cases, I won't put on bike shorts, I won't get into cycling shoes and cleats. I'll just be on a pair of sneakers, and a pair of pants and a whatever t-shirt. And I'll do my five minutes. And still that time is better spent than if I had done nothing. Yeah. And just as a side note, I don't think we're recommending anyone do long training rides indoors with sneakers and pants. Yeah, I wouldn't do you know, I wouldn't pull up the blender and do an hour and 43 minutes like that, that definitely not be a good choice.
Mac Cassin 8:22
Yeah, really, that small amount can be a big deal. And that's something I learned more from my rehab time coming back from injuries of I've had multiple periods where I've literally done a two-minute ride one day, two and a half the next three the day after that and just slowly building up, it might when you look back to what your peak training amount is, that might seem like nothing. But yeah, just even those really short sessions can be really good for you mentally and mentally.
Neal Henderson 8:46
Yep, definitely, movement is good. Sure. Again, comparing yourself to what you've done, or what your best has been, is often not super helpful, especially during the holiday time or those busy periods of time, like you have during the holidays, with lots of things going on. To manage to get in a little bit what you can and don't stress about what you are missing.
Mac Cassin 9:05
Yeah. And we definitely go into this topic a bit more in another one of our episodes where we talk about taking time away from the bike, and that's it's definitely applicable here. Especially if you're traveling and can't bring your bike or don't have access to stuff. It's not the end of the world, it's gonna be okay.
Neal Henderson 9:19
Yeah, and we do know that lots of us that exercise in what we do is part of our mental health strategies to and in some cases, with the stress and with seeing people and spending time we sometimes have a lot more going on in the mental health arena and not being able to do the activity that we're used to definitely be a minus. So that's why incorporating something other than what you're normally used to would definitely be a helpful thing. So getting out for a walk or using some sort of gym equipment that you normally wouldn't use. If you're traveling and they have an elliptical or a recumbent bike. For me. That's Those are not my top two choices of activities that I would do. On a given daily basis, but if I have that, versus nothing darn straight, I'm gonna hop on that elliptical and go ahead and do a little something or sit on a recumbent bike for a few minutes and get a little something done.
Mac Cassin 10:10
Yeah, and with all this talk about being away from your training, you have to ask yourself, why you are away from your training, and it's because you're probably with friends or family. And it becomes really important. If you're not seeing people that often or you're not socializing with them that often it's enjoying that time with them, don't be thinking about the training you're missing, try and make sure that you're there, you're present, you're enjoying the holidays, enjoying time with friends and family that you wouldn't normally have.
Neal Henderson 10:36
So pulling things together Mac couple big picture, when we think about the holiday time we're here, and we got to enjoy what we've got. And to try to plan ahead, if you can do a little bit more training before you have a period of time where you're going to be doing a little bit less, that's a great idea. If that doesn't happen. Also, you can't stress about it, you just not gonna keep moving forward and get something done, you're gonna feel generally better even if it's just a couple minutes, five minutes, doing a little yoga, a little bit of yoga will definitely be time well spent. If you can convince some of your friends or family that you're with to go out and just do a little bit of a walk again, maybe it's not your normal training, it's not your heartbeats not going to be as elevated, you're not going to be doing that same kind of energy expenditure. But getting out and moving in that way is definitely going to be helpful for you.
Mac Cassin 11:22
Yeah, and do keep in mind that if you ask and get your family or friends to go do something with you that wouldn't normally do, or they wouldn't normally do. Don't be surprised to pay back the favor when they ask you to come to one of their preferred hobbies.
Neal Henderson 11:33
Yep, got to reciprocate. That's definitely all part of it here. And also, eating and drinking sure things are going to be out of your typical rhythm and what you're used to doing. And again, you're not going to torpedo your entire year, if you eat too much and have too much to drink a few days, that's just life, it's there's not black and white, that it has to be all or none that you have to be perfect. Or if you have a few days where you're a bit off of your normal. And heck, even if you've gained a pound or two over the holidays, in most cases, we're many weeks months away from a performance and weight is one of those things that can be a little bit of a touchy subject. But I've seen lots of athletes perform much better at a weight that they didn't think was necessarily ideal, but they had world championship level performances or world medal performances. And so it's not the weight that actually ever gives you the ability to perform and or having more weight than you expected doesn't prevent you from being able to perform.
Mac Cassin 12:32
Yeah, and with that, again, we'll dial back a bit to the drinking side of things because that can often happen during the holidays. The big thing I'll say to that just stays hydrated. While you're enjoying that if you need to alternate. That's probably the smart way to go and a beer and then a big glass of water and continue that that's probably if you do happen to wake up hungover one day at the holidays, just know that some light exercise is one of the best hangovers cures out there. Don't be afraid to go for a walk even if you're not feeling particularly spry.
Neal Henderson 13:01
Generally, you'll feel better after getting out and doing a little something
Mac Cassin 13:05
So with all that being said, I hope that whatever your plans are for the holidays, that you have a good time you don't stress too much about any training you might miss. And just stay tuned because we are going to be hitting you in the new year with some tips to get you back on track and set some goals for the coming season.