Nice Recovery
REST AND RECOVERY ARE ESSENTIAL FOR LONG-TERM
ATHLETE DEVELOPMENT By Dave Peszek
The U.S. Ski Team’s hockey games are a great example of active rest.
TOM KELLY/ U. S. SKI TEAM
Name the activities that you do to train as a ski racer, and I
bet your list will look something like this:
skiing drills
focused freeskiing
gate training, long and short
dryland: agility, functional movements, strength training, aer-
obic training, anaerobic training, speed training, visual training,
core training, direction changes, etc.
What’s missing? Rest and recovery. They are part of your training, they are not “non-training” events. They should be scheduled — daily, weekly, monthly and yearly — and given the same
attention as any other type of training.
So far this season, the vast majority of juniors, masters, coaches and even some parents have engaged in summer on-snow
training; school; fall sports; social commitments; equipment
maintenance; summer and fall dryland workouts; winter maintenance workouts; early season on-snow camps; regular on-snow training; holiday camps; travel; and homework. Did I forget anything? I’m sure I did — the point is, you’ve likely been
running at full speed.
If, after all this, you feel strong, fit, flexible, mentally sharp and
relaxed, and are skiing super clean and strong on a gradually
tapering amount of volume, then please immediately give your
coach a huge pay raise.
The unfortunate reality is that most of us don’t feel this way
— stressors of society, travel, time, lack of enough sleep (a
huge issue for kids in today’s society; they need seven to nine
hours per night), training and competition all conspire to slow
our training adaptation response, weakening our performance
