Lack of Sleep Slowing Me Down

Going to keep this short and simple as it is getting late and after today's performance I really do not want to see a repeat.  As we all know sleep is one of the most important and also often overlooked aspects of training, well recently I have been wasting too much time trying to decide what trail shoes to buy than getting a reasonable nights sleep.

There is way to much info at our fingertips that it is so easy to spend hours wasting time analyzing what shoe is best for you.  Should I buy the Brooks Cascadia 7's or the Salomon Crossmax etc.  Well next thing you know it is after midnight and have I made a decision?  NO!!!  Well that was a big waste.  Next night I am pondering between the Huka's and Asics Fuji Racer's.

As a whole never thought much of it in relation to my performance as I usually do not worry about timing my runs based on distance.  Why bother?  I do know that I have ran a 10k in 40 minutes on a 20k day.  Also a couple weeks ago I ran a 30min 8k.  Basically I have somewhat of an idea.  Than there was today.

For some reason I decided to time a 5k since I did not have time for a longer run.  I had looked at the clock on my phone just when I left the vehicle, performed a few quick dynamic stretches and started out.  My IT Band was a little tight but not near at its worst and the run was feeling quite easy.  At the half way turn around point I decided to push it a little and carried it through until the final 500m when I hit a bit of a wall so I backed off a little.  Upon conclusion I check my time and WHAT? Did I run a 22-24 minute 5k, ouch.

At first I was quite disappointed with the performance knowing that I should be able to run a sub 20 minute time.  After getting into the vehicle I did recall an article relating to sleep deprivation and performance.  The article mentioned that performance can be 20% poorer with lack of sleep.  I think today I just experienced this.  I SUCKED, LOL!!!!


Here is a good article on lack of sleep and performance at runningtimes.com.  It is not the one I recalled today but some good reading.

But again who really cares, I run cause I can and I like it.  Running for the long haul;)