How to deal with a crappy workout

It's happened to all of us at some point in our 'training'. We came to the gym ready to workout but about 10-15min into the workout there's about a 1,000 other places you'd rather be. Or you start your morning run routine and just a few blocks away from your house and you are walking, tired, tight, just not feeling it. It happens to everybody and it sucks when it does. Some people depend on that release of endorphins from exercise to get through the day like those 16 year olds buying 'incense' to get that 'totally legal' high. When things like this happen it's hard to stay motivated and focused on your goals, string a few bad workouts together and you might quit all together. So let's look at what you can do to recover from a crappy workout. After the bad workout ask two questions:

1) Have you been resting enough?

 An overlooked aspect of any workout is often rest. In bodybuilding land it is well known that your muscles do all their growing when you are resting. Endurance athletes, especially runners, are obsessed with rest as well. Running is hard on your joints and spending 5-6 days a week road running can destroy your body. Look at any 5K or marathon training plan, there's rest in there and it's not optional. So look at your past workouts. If you have been hitting it hard lately and had one day as a set back take that as a cue from your body to back off for a day or two and ease yourself back into it.  In addition to the actual workload look at your sleep patterns lately.  This job is tough on sleep schedules and its no surprise that sleep deprived athletes can struggle in the gym.

2) What have you been eating?

 In some lackluster workouts I can almost pinpoint the thing that I ate or drank that affected my performance the next day or so.  If you ate a pint of ice cream last night or a two packages of Eileen's cookies instead of good vegetables/fruit and healthy complex carbohydrates you should expect to struggle in the gym the next day. Food is fuel and crappy fuel equals crappy performance.  Of course if you spent the night out boozing then you are not only dehydrating yourself but you are also likely staying out late and alcohol actually hinders your sleep, the proverbial double whammy.  In looking at my own nutrition I'm amazed at how little water I can take in sometimes, drinking coffee, Red Bulls, diet pops etc. instead of water.

 Often you can diagnose the reason for your bad workout by looking at the above two questions.

 'Gee whiz Tom I went for my run this morning and I only ran 1.5 miles instead of my usual 4 what gives?'

'Well Bill didn't you spend last night drinking beer with your buddies and then eat that cheeseburger that has a Krispy Kreme donut as the bun?'

There are however times when you are doing everything right and you still have a bad workout. You basically have two choices: Power through your lackluster workout or take a break.  Both have their time and place. My recommendation is to try to feel the difference between tiredness and injury.  If you are injured then rest up and let it heal. If you are just tired then I'd say work through it but mentally lower your expectations for this workout and tell yourself you will make up for it the next time.

Bill's Donut Burger is real