The Truth About Adrenal Fatigue

This article is mostly about the explosive energy weightlifters need to do their workouts. I confess, a lot of it is lost on me. The part of this article that interests me, however, is how adrenaline works:

At the sight of a near accident, your brain (sends) a nerve impulse directly via the preganglionic sympathetic fibers to your adrenal medulla to secrete adrenaline, otherwise known as epinephrine (or what's widely known as adrenaline)... Epinephrine increases blood pressure, respiration rate, heart rate, increases glucose, and dilates the pupils, all for the purpose of enabling you to quickly and safely get out of a potentially life-threatening situation. This (is) a purely autonomic reaction that came straight from your brain.

So we have a stress situation, say a face-plant, and our bodies dump extra glucose into the blood stream to help us deal with the emergency. This is glucose over and above the levels we might normally have. Our bodies don’t realize we don’t need it for something like a face-plant. It just happens.

This gives me some idea about the Mount Sano 15k. I had a bunch of rolled ankles (pain induced stress leading to small glucose dumps) and a few face-plants (major glucose dumps) so that I nearly bonked on a race I should have run with enough energy to kick at the end. Each incident was extra energy being pissed away.

It seems to me that that is the why of staying calm and under control. This applies to panic at catching up, training against face-plants and rolls or something as simple as passing. Instead of wild burst to get ahead of someone on a tight course, just ask them to move, “On your left.” These burst passes leave me fatigued. Passing should be gradual and under control.

We start the race with a set amount of available energy and get precious little from carb drinks like Gatorade or GU packets. Like Steve always says, everything helps.

Running Log: March 1 - 7

Total Miles for the Week: 26

03/02/10 Ran the 3 mile loop in my neighborhood. I tried to run slow, as this was a welcome back recovery run but it felt soooo good to run fast. I reckon if I let myself do that once every two weeks, it should be alright. If I can stay healthy between now and April 10, I should easily set a PR at the Palace Saloon 5k.

03/03/10 Ran 5 junk miles. I was surprised at how fatigued I was last night. Got more sleep last night and tonight, more of the same. Thinking about going south for a few days to see friends and family. Deeply melancholy.

03/05/10 Ran an easy 3 miles at the Park. I was going to do some body weight stuff but thought better of it being I planned to run 15 miles the next day and I was still recovering from the Thrill in the Hills.

03/06/10 Ran 15 miles at Forest Meadows. It wasn't good. I mean, the running was what I expected. Maybe a little harder and I'm pretty sure I was pushing a Baatan like death march fatigue but the running was about right. It was having to dodge city busses and Mercedes on the trail that kind of sucked ass. Also, the goddman diesel fumes. Thank you rich horse riding assholes. The run was good though.

A note about the week after a big race: Next time I need to respect the level of recovery I'm looking at. I needed a much lighter week than I gave myself. It will be three times worse in May. Respect that.