Embracing the Off-Season: A Guide for Athletes

By: Sam Dancer

Off-season begins! For a 37-year-old family man who runs multiple businesses and a not-for-profit, this looks a little different than when I was in my 20s. Regardless if your off-season starts after semis or after the games or if you are in your 20’s, taking some downtime is really important. Mentally and physically, although the two are not exclusive. If your body is trashed, most likely your mind will follow suit. I constantly see athletes who over-train year-round and run into serious health issues. Orthopedicly, hormonally, psychologically, and relationally.

Giving your body adequate time off is important for maintaining your well-being. Time off doesn’t mean training is necessarily easy. It means it is tolerable and we want it to be this way until the desire to train starts coming back. I always said, “at the beginning of football season my favorite sport was football. At the end of the football season, my least favorite sport was football”. With a proper off-season, we avoid total burnout and can better manage how we feel toward the end of a season so that our least favorite sport isn’t CrossFit. It’s time to embrace the off-season!

Finding Balance: Training and Personal Life

For me, training will essentially be cut in half. That vacant half will be spent with my family and putting time into growing our businesses. This is something I would recommend to any young athlete. Diversifying your “portfolio”. Not putting all your eggs in one basket is an age-old piece of wisdom that reigns true. Find something you are passionate about and grow it so when that day comes and you are no longer competitive in sport you have a means of generating income as well as joy. Now, this doesn’t mean completely omitting any potential physical progress. There are most likely weaknesses we could make our primary focus during this reduced time of volume and intensity regardless of age.

Setting Off-Season Goals: Maintaining Motivation

For me, being a larger and stronger athlete building an aerobic base is what I spend my time doing in the off-season. Longer and lower intensity bouts on the bike, row erg, ski erg, paddling, running, and swimming. For most people in the sport, it is the opposite. Most athletes need to make strength a higher priority during this time. Nonetheless making sure you are doing it at a rate that is tolerable and doesn’t feel so burdensome.

Even though training is reduced I still find it helpful to have some off-season goals. For me, I like to have a few longer aerobic events to participate in like a triathlon and or HYROX. For others, this might be a weightlifting or powerlifting meet—something to keep you honest during this time period. You don’t want all your hard work to be completely lost from doing absolutely nothing. Train those weaknesses and make sure to slowly progress back into higher volume and intensity.

Let’s make 2025 our fittest year yet! Click here to grow with us during your own off-season!