Including 'B/C' Races Into Your Plan

Racing in the lead-up to your "A" race has many benefits. And it’s important to decide which are your high and low-priority races so you can taper accordingly. 

Factors to consider when planning your approach to lead-up races are:

1. Duration of your event
2. How much training you have in the 2 weeks prior to your event
3. Your current fitness for this event
4. How hard that you plan to race
5. Your racing experience, and your self-knowledge for taper preference

Guide For Events Less than 3 Hours

‘B’ races are quite important but not the main goal of your season. A four-day taper is usually enough for these.

‘C’ races are events you do for fun or as practice for your big goals. Taper for 24-48 hours for these.

Step One: If the week before your race is recovery - swap it to fall after your race (How Do I Move a Workout?).

Step Two: Taper before your race

• Cut your workout durations by half of what is planned.
• Don’t change the intensity of your speed workouts. Reduce the frequency of the intervals by half (i.e. 4 x 4mins would become 2 x 4mins), and shorten the warm-up and cool-down (if necessary).
• Ideally, take two full rest days in the week before your B/C event (preferably Monday and the day before your race).
• Alternatively, copy and paste the workouts from the final 4 days or 48 hours of your plan (depending on race priority) to replace your planned workouts.

Step Three: Recover after your race

• Take 48 hours off to allow for a full recovery.
• For the remainder of the week, continue with training as planned (reducing intensities to Zone 2 until you feel well recovered).
• If the week includes fitness tests, skip these - consider using your race data to check your thresholds (isolate your data).
• After this, resume training to plan

   

Guide For Events More than 3 Hours

As your B/C event requires a good level of endurance, it’s important to decide your race priority - so you can taper accordingly:

‘B’ races are quite important but not the main goal of your season - consider a 10-14 day taper

‘C’ races are events you do for fun or as practice for your big goals - 7 days may be enough

Keep in mind that the easier you plan to pace your B/C event, the less taper and recovery you are likely to need.

Step One: If the week before your race is recovery - swap it to fall after your race (How Do I Move a Workout?)

Step Two: Taper before your race

• Two weeks before your event, taper by reducing your training to 65-85% of all volumes and intensities and reduce your long weekend workouts by 50-70%.
• Don’t change the intensity of your speed workouts. Reduce the frequency of the intervals by 70-90% (i.e. 4 x 4mins might become 3 x 4mins), and shorten the warm-up and cool-down (if necessary).
• The week before your race, copy and paste the final taper week of your plan to replace your planned workouts.

Step Three: Recover after your race

• Take 48-72 hours off to allow for recovery.
• For the remainder of the week, continue with training as planned. Reduce intensities (to Zone 1/2) and volumes until you feel well recovered.
• If the week includes fitness tests, skip these - and (if needed) reschedule for a few weeks.
• After this, resume training to plan

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