What to do after your goal race (and the mistake most runners and cyclists make)
- Emma O'Toole
- May 24
- 5 min read
After completing a goal race, many runners and cyclists make the same mistake: either trying to hold onto peak fitness or losing structure entirely. Both approaches can stall long-term progress. This article explains what to do after a race, why you cannot stay race fit year-round, and how to use the transition period effectively by maintaining a base, developing strength, and addressing weaknesses to prepare for your next training block.
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TRAINING BREAKDOWN
"You cannot be race fit year round. Please read that again."
By Emma O'Toole
Hi there!
If you have raced this spring, firstly, congratulations!
Doing the training to get to a start line and crossing a finish line is no easy feat. You have been juggling training sessions around work, family, life admin, and everything else that does not pause just because you have a race on the calendar. Whatever happened on the day, that deserves to be acknowledged.
Maybe you have an autumn or winter event pencilled in, maybe you are still deciding. Either way, you are in that in-between phase where the training block is done, the race is over, and it feels a bit too soon to start building again.
I get this question a lot at this time of year, so today I want to dive into what I would do in this transition period and why it matters more than most runners and cyclists realise.
There are two things I see happen after a goal race and neither of them sets you up well for what comes next.
1. Trying to hold onto peak fitness.
Your race went well, you feel strong and fit, and instinct is telling you to keep training at a similar level. I completely understand that desire! But your body needs a break from the demands of race specific training. That does not mean stopping entirely, it means changing the training stress you are applying to your body.
2. Falling off a cliff.
Your race is done and your next event is 6 months or more away, so your training drops over the following weeks and months. This one is just as common, especially for runners and cyclists juggling busy lives who find that without the structure of a training block, sessions are easier to miss.
A period of lower training load after a big race is completely fine, your body needs it and your mind probably does too! But there is a difference between intentional recovery and unintentional detraining, and that difference matters a lot for your long term progress.
You cannot be race fit year round. Please read that again.
Your body was not designed for it and your training plan should not ask it of you. The runners and cyclists who keep improving year after year are the ones whose training has natural peaks and troughs, periods where volume, intensity, and/or race specificity are high, and periods where they are purposely lower.
This is what periodisation means in practice: planned variation. Accepting that there are times in the year where you are not race fit, and that those times are just as important as the ones where you are. The bridge period after your spring "A race" can be one of those times and used well, it sets up everything that comes next!
There are three things I come back to in any transition period between key races:
1. Working on your weakness,
2. Maintaining a solid base.
3. Developing your strength foundations.
Every race and training block gives you information. It tells you what your body handled well and what it struggled with. Maybe your aerobic base was solid but you faded on the hills. Maybe you felt strong early but could not sustain your target pace when it mattered. That information is incredibly valuable and this in-between phase is the perfect time to act on it.
For me personally, I had a spring marathon as my "A race" one year and a hilly trail marathon 10 months later as my next. I did not try to hold onto that peak marathon fitness. I used the summer to work on hills, both because of the race's elevation profile and because I lack durability holding pace when running uphill. That summer was spent developing those qualities: running hills, building hill specific strength and pace, and keeping my long run ticking over at around 20km.
I also used this period to focus on what my strength training could do for my hill running. The posterior chain, and in particular the glutes, is exceptionally important for uphill running and where I added emphasis on. And let's not forget that what goes up must come down, so I also worked on how my body, (particularly my quads) handled the eccentric loading from running downhill.
During that trail marathon in December, every one of those steps felt like a repeated effort box jump that I had been doing in my strength training. I knew I could handle it, even with 20 miles and 1000’s of metres elevation already in the legs.
Of course, not every runner and cyclist has a clear transition period after their spring race. This in-between phase can also look different if you are moving into a summer of shorter races, whether that is a midweek track league, local road races, weekend crits, or TT’s. For some runners and cyclists, a summer track league series or a midweek racing block is itself an A block, something they have been building towards and structuring their training around. If that is you, treat it with the same intentionality you would give any other key period of your year.
A well designed training year has key focus periods where everything is built around performing at your best. The races around those focus periods keep you sharp and are enjoyable in their own right, but you cannot peak for everything and trying to do so means you peak for nothing.
Knowing which period matters most and structuring your training around that, including your strength work, is one of the most important things a good training plan does.
This in-between phase is not lost time. By doing some work on your weakness, maintaining a base that you keep ticking over, and 2x targeted strength sessions a week, you’ll get to your next training block in better shape than you left the last one.
To quell any fears here, your race-specific fitness will come back, it always does. And when it does, it will have something stronger underneath it.
If you want to talk through what this looks like for your specific situation, come and join my free community. There are over 800 runners and cyclists over 30 in there and this is exactly the kind of conversation that is happening this week.
And if you are interested in BUILT TO RUN OVER 30 or BUILT TO RIDE OVER 30, both programmes are built around a 12 week periodised approach to strength training which you get lifetime access to.
Happy running and riding!
Emma x
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