Tapering. I thought everyone hated it, the nervousness, the bizarre new injuries, being used to eat with relative freedom and then losing some of that freedom as the weekly mileage drops. I thought there was a united front against tapering until my friend Laura told me she loves tapering. So here is why I hate tapering, beyond what I've already expressed...
Running primarily fills an emotional need for me. I make a point to let people know I like to run; not exercise. I take the elevator to go 2 flights and almost every form of exercise I only engage in...Pilates, swimming, Yoga.... with the thought of "how will this help my running."
When that emotional outlet gone, there isn't anything really to fill that spot. After a stressful day, I'd go for a run, so when that gets pulled back, a beer or 4 would sound great, but oh wait, I'm tapering. I know that drinking and tapering are not mutually exclusive, but I've know I'll run better with yet another outlet gone. It seems perfectly set up for disaster, let's take away your #1 stress relieving activity more and more as you get closer and closer to the potentially stressful event of race day.
It is more than just trading one addiction for another (as suggested by the title quote from Annie Hall), it is abandoning trusted forms of support in exchange for anxiety.
This is where I wish I had more of a positive spin, more of a "well, kids, the lesson we all learned today was..." epilogue. But I got nothing. Just the honest confession that there is so much more work to be done in this phase of running for me. However....there is one thing I suppose I do love about tapering. It reminds me of my love, my need, for running. So, yeah, I guess that's something.
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