For those that have been around professional sports and particularly cycling there is this concept of the silly season. The silly season is that period towards the end of the race calendar. Its silly because you have pros still racing for one team but potentially jockeying to get new contracts to their existing teams or trying to find new contracts or even negotiating transfers. All the while team management is trying to secure new sponsorship and get equipment lined up for the next season and trying to close out the current season.

So why am I talking about professional cyclists? Well pros aren’t the only athletes with a silly season. In recent conversations with several of my athletes I have had them refer to the period after their race season is over as their own silly season. What makes it silly is that they aren’t ready to begin off-season training or they are wrapping up one sports season and to start a fall/winter sport. I find that self-coached athletes often struggle the most with the training and non-training demands of their own silly seasons.

So today I am going to talk a bit more about this crazy time of the year for competitive amateur athletes and how to survive it, but before we dive in I have some notes.

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Ok, the race season is over and you are on the edge of burn out but you still have 2 or more months before the off-season begins. So what are you to do? Lets talk about what I share with my athletes.

• Relax and don’t take things so seriously
• Have fun
• Try new things
• Train with out structure

OK, your spring summer races are over and you are about to start your fall winter sport? So what are you to do? Actually this is a bit easier to understand but 90% of my responses to my athletes depend on the following:

• What sport are you transitioning to?
• What are the goals for this season?
• What level of commitment is being applied to the sport?
• How long is the Fall Winter season going to last?

Music for show intro, outro, and mid-play break: “Jahzzar (betterwithmusic.com) CC BY-SA”
Intro and Outro music: Battle from the Crime Scene Album from Jahzzar
Mid-play break music: Please Listen Carefully from the Tumbling Dishes Like Old-Man’s Wishes Album