Coach Maria's Monday Minute: Something Is Better Than Nothing

Welcome to Coach Maria’s Monday Minute!

Have you ever had a case of the ‘I don’t wannas’?

I see it in athletes, coworkers, and family. Continuing to move forward is often both a mental and physical challenge. Here’s a way to keep moving without completely giving up on training. Remember this: something is better than nothing. Even if you’ve had a terrible day and don’t have much time, just do something.

So what does that look like? I do try to make my ‘something’ at least 20 minutes long.

Here are three examples for triathletes of 'something' that is better than nothing.

Swim:

-5-10 minutes easy swimming (choice of stroke)

-5x100 on the fastest interval you can hold with 20 seconds between efforts.

Any time left over is cool down.

Bike:

-5 minutes easy (80+ RPM), 5x30 seconds each leg of 1-leg drill

-Mini Russian Pyramid as follows:

- 30 sec easy

- 5 sec all out, 25 sec easy

- 10 sec all out, 20 sec easy

- 15 sec all out, 15 sec easy

- 20 sec all out, 10 sec easy

- 25 sec all out, 5 sec easy

- 30 sec all out

30 seconds easy, then repeat the mini Russian Pyramid again.

Cool down to the 20 minute time limit

Run:

10 minutes easy running

10 minutes as strides:

- 20 sec strides

- 40 sec easy