Oh, Snap...Where are You?

In general, things are going better on the Oval, and I think my thyroid levels must be pretty good (I'll find out for sure next Tuesday when I go in to the doctor for a follow-up visit).  My lap times in endurance workouts are creeping back down towards where they should be, and I'm not having any workouts that are following what I think of as the "hypo profile"...where each lap is at least a second slower than the previous lap (this is especially fun in 3K or 5K races).

However, there is one aspect of my skating that doesn't seem to have come back.

I miss my "snap."

Now, I make no claim to having any sort of top speed on ice (or inlines).  I'm a distance skater, and in addition to the clumsiness I've mentioned once or twice here, I was also blessed with an abundance of slow-twitch muscles and a dearth of fast-twitch.  In fact, I'm pretty sure that the only fast-twitch muscles I possess are those involved in eating and talking.

But still, I've become accustomed to a certain speed for my tempo and interval workouts.  I always think of 40-second laps as kind of standard for intervals; workouts that are supposed to be done at 70 or 80% might be 41's or 42's, and shorter tempos or actual races might be as low as 37's, but to me, "interval" says "40."  This seems to be true whether I'm on ice or inlines (which is a bit strange, because ice should be faster...if your technique is good enough, that is.)

But this summer, I think I've only done two laps at 39, and none faster than that.  Interval laps that should be 40's are usually 41's, and often higher.  I'm skating hard, pushing myself, technique is feeling about like it always does...and yet, I'm slow.

I'm hoping this is just a "haven't done much effective speedwork while hypo and just need to catch up" sort of thing, rather than a "well, what do you expect; you are getting older, you know" kind of thing. Because the "snapless" trend has been building over the last couple years...my 500 times have been getting slower rather than faster...and I am, of course, getting older.  When I started getting really serious about skating, and really improving, I figured I'd have at least until I was 50 before I started noticing age-related slowdowns.  Now, though--2 months shy of 48--I don't know.  Maybe the slowdown is starting.

Coach TieGuy, of course, would remind me has reminded me many times that I'm not training for the 500.  I'm training for the 3K and 5K, and those are getting faster (or at least, they were last year).   In fact, I usually  think of the 500 as a "warmup" rather than a race.  And, of course, it's the preseason right now; I'm doing workouts, not races, and perhaps I should just shut the 2 inch binders and quit looking at past years' data.  But I can't help looking (I even have a little chart made, on which I enter average lap times from this year's and previous years' comparable workouts.  I stare at that little chart a lot).  And I can't help wondering if the slowdown has started, if I've already skated my lifetime Personal Bests.

And I can't help wanting my snap back