The Post Season Peak

The peaking process is always one that is tough to plan out for coaches.  You want your athlete to be fresh for the championship meets but at the same time you know that you can't have them peak for their district meet and then hope to have them running at the top of their game again a month later.  How do you approach the peaking process for post-season competition?

First, you want to drop volume by up to 10-20% (but no more, especially for sprinters) each week from the first post season competition to the last.  You want to maintain the intensity of your workouts though.  Therefore if your 400 runner had been doing 5x300 on their volume day, you will want to drop one 300 but maintain the pace that you had run before.  Dropping off the intensity is a mistake many coaches make hoping to "save" the hard efforts for the race or "not wanting to tire the athlete."  The truth is if you have recovery days built in the appropriate places already this will not be an issue.

Next, you want to make sure they are doing their post workout rehab such as cooldowns, icing if necessary, etc.  This can often go overlooked during the season but you don't want to have any snags late in the season because an injury can derail the goals the athlete has with their post season competition.

Lastly, remember that the athlete needs to have the proper mentality to peak as well.  Competition will become tougher and more meaningful as the post season progresses so if the athlete does not have the confidence to race, they will definitely not fair well.  You must remind the athlete of where they stand and give them the moral support to be able to compete at their highest level.  An athlete that doesn't believe they can qualify rarely does.