Evening races after work: How do you find them?

Chivito550

Would be interested to see how others deal with evening races. For me personally, I feel at my best early in the morning, when I am freshest. I'm used to racing mostly on a weekend afternoon, after a nice sleep in. I generally race within about 4-6 hours of getting out of bed, and during this time I am doing very little to tire myself out. If I have a race on a Saturday evening, I just stay in bed longer, and keep relaxed during the day.

But the evening meets on a work day I just can't seem to hack. Outside of my first track season, when I was on a big upward curve anyway, I have never run a PB after a day in the office. I never feel good going into these races. Feel drained, sleepy and lethargic. I've got to the stage that I don't really bother with the graded meets on Wednesday evenings anymore. The built up nerves throughout the work day are hard to deal with, and by the time I get to the track I am wrecked. Even with training I can feel a huge difference. I never feel as good on the track doing reps on a Wednesday night as I do on a Saturday and Sunday morning.

Do others find post work evening races to be a struggle too? If so, how do you deal with it? Or do you even bother with them? Or are you more an evening person, who can't wake up quickly enough for a morning or afternoon race?

tailgunner

I've only done it once and had a similar experience to what you describe. I have an evening 10k race coming up in a couple of months though, so I'd be interested to see how others handle it too.

Much prefer doing races in the morning. It's odd though, because I can't face doing sessions in the morning. I'd always choose to do them in the evening after work.

uvox

I usually knocked off a half-marathon every evening after work. Or after what I though was the end of work. Body is more flexible at end of the day and it's awesome in summer evenings. Prefer evening and night running. Hit better speeds.

Utdfan20titles

uvox wrote: »

I usually knocked off a half-marathon every evening after work. Or after what I though was the end of work. Body is more flexible at end of the day and it's awesome in summer evenings. Prefer evening and night running. Hit better speeds.

No link?

Wubble Wubble

I definitely prefer morning races. Get up, get out, get it done, go home....and then you've the rest of the day for life stuff. I find all the waiting around for afternoon/evening races (added to work etc) leaves me a bit drained when the start finally comes. Don't get me wrong, I have done and will continue to do them (BHAA have a few in the summer) but I just tend to do better with the early starts!

dublin runner

Obviously quite different in approaches (short vs. long distance), but I find a very small jog in the morning to make the world of difference. Loosens the body, without tiring and helps get rid of some of the prerace nerves. In fact I am going to start doing this for most races, especially the ones 10am or later.

*By the way, you simply cannot compare evening jogs to full blooded racing as one poster has above. Chalk and cheese.

BeepBeep67

Chivito550 wrote: »

Would be interested to see how others deal with evening races. For me personally, I feel at my best early in the morning, when I am freshest. I'm used to racing mostly on a weekend afternoon, after a nice sleep in. I generally race within about 4-6 hours of getting out of bed, and during this time I am doing very little to tire myself out. If I have a race on a Saturday evening, I just stay in bed longer, and keep relaxed during the day.

But the evening meets on a work day I just can't seem to hack. Outside of my first track season, when I was on a big upward curve anyway, I have never run a PB after a day in the office. I never feel good going into these races. Feel drained, sleepy and lethargic. I've got to the stage that I don't really bother with the graded meets on Wednesday evenings anymore. The built up nerves throughout the work day are hard to deal with, and by the time I get to the track I am wrecked. Even with training I can feel a huge difference. I never feel as good on the track doing reps on a Wednesday night as I do on a Saturday and Sunday morning.

Do others find post work evening races to be a struggle too? If so, how do you deal with it? Or do you even bother with them? Or are you more an evening person, who can't wake up quickly enough for a morning or afternoon race?

I haven't noticed if I'm honest.

It just so happens I've ran my 2 fastest master's 5k times in the evening and have been happy with my 3k graded performances (no AM race to compare with).
Most of my sessions would be done midweek after work as you are normally trying to balance a long run at the weekend, so I guess you can train your body to perform at a certain time of the day.

I am connected to several US facebook groups that knock out interval sessions at 5:30am and see races starting at 6am in the morning, and although I would run early regularly enough I think doing a session or a race would be a challenge.

Oregano_State

It never bothers me to be honest. I do most of my training in the evening time so my body's fairly used to performing at that time.

DubOnHoliday

I think once you have time to prepare properly, it doesn't matter what time the race is at. I like to be there an hour before, relax, get a sufficient warm up done, a chat with friends, the usual. Of course this all went to hell last wed when the DART was delayed by 40 mins and I arrived at the start line at 7:29 for a 7:30 race Getting straight into a 300 m climb with no warm up

Tombo2001

I work in an office - I don't mind at all if I have spent most of the day at the desk, ie resting.

If it was a Saturday evening race, if I had been on the go all day, I probably wouldn't like it as much.

Chivito550

Tombo2001 wrote: »

I work in an office - I don't mind at all if I have spent most of the day at the desk, ie resting.

If it was a Saturday evening race, if I had been on the go all day, I probably wouldn't like it as much.

I find being at the desk staring at a screen all day in a stuffy office is far from resting. You'd be wrecked from it, despite getting up every half hour to stretch the legs.

For me, 2 of our 3 track sessions are on weekend mornings, with just one session being on a weekday evening. I do my gym work and some steep hill sprints in the evening after work, but nothing prepares you more for the demands of a track race than track sessions, and the majority of ours are in the morning, so that doesn't prepare me for evening races.

IvoryTower

Would a track session sat not leave you tired for a track session sun? Wouldn't be for me

I don't mind evening running myself.I train tues, thurs & sat so most if it's done in the evening anyway. I might take the day off for my goal races end of the summer to be well rested

Chivito550

IvoryTower wrote: »

Would a track session sat not leave you tired for a track session sun? Wouldn't be for me

I don't mind evening running myself.I train tues, thurs & sat so most if it's done in the evening anyway. I might take the day off for my goal races end of the summer to be well rested

At first I was, but I'm well used to 2 mornings in a row now. One day is flat out speed, while the other is speed endurance/endurance so never using the same energy systems on both days.

I took a day off for a Wednesday night race last year. I drove myself demented sitting at home all day waiting for the race. Don't think I'll bother doing that again.

Chartsengrafs

I like them. But I'm well aware that it's because I do most of my running in the evenings and it takes me a long time to warm up into morning runs in general.
Agree with your point about nervous energy though, I recall being really stressed about making it to some post-work duathlons a few years back. Expended a lot of energy worrying about getting out on time, eating correctly etc.

Timmaay

Chivito550 wrote: »

I find being at the desk staring at a screen all day in a stuffy office is far from resting. You'd be wrecked from it, despite getting up every half hour to stretch the legs.

There's your problem so ha, this phenomenon of office jobs is an incredibly recent development in the lifetime of humans (last60 yrs?), we really really really are not designed to sit down at a desk all day long! Even getting up for afew minutes every 1/2 hr isn't really enough 2bh (but much better than nothing I'll admit ha), however what you really need is a stand up office desk/stool, or like what's been done in some schools nowadays, basically a desk with a built-in exercise bike! Or alternatively like me you can quit the office job fully and become a dairyfarmer ha, defo no fear of sitting down too much for me ha!

On the evening races, they don't hugely bother me, I've pulled a decent few pbs at graded 3k etc, I remember one of them it was well after 9pm when our race was on! But IMCs I do tend to run better, they are usually afternoon. My worst races are often Leinsters or any meets that last 1/2 the day and you might not run until 6 or 7hours after you 1st step inside the venue! That's a much bigger hurdle for me than the actual time of day ha!