For many athletes, the offseason is the bridge between the end-of-summer finish lines and next season's starting lines. While you might be considering turning the dial down on your athletic performance, you may actually be setting yourself up for failure in the coming year. In this episode of the Purple Patch Podcast, Ironman Master Coach Matt Dixon highlights the common mistake many athletes make in their approach to training and performance habits during the most important phase of training. (22:08) "There is seldom a time where a complete removal of structure is your best option. Because when you remove structure, and focus, you lose all organizational framework. And you're also going to miss an opportunity of preparation. And that critical preparation is often the catalyst, the number one performance predictor for you having a wonderful season next year. " Matt makes a case for a radical shift in approach during the winter months to set up a platform of resilience and increased performance readiness for the coming season. In this episode Matt covers: Part One: A Broken System The problem with magic race builds and the short-term approach. (14:10) "you don't need to be year-round in your obsession. It doesn't need to feel like a monkey on the back. But you equally cannot expect greatness and ongoing personal development if you're only focused for a short period of time." Part Two: Shifting the Lens - Key supporting Ingredients for a time-starved athlete. (24:20) "What we're looking to do is to find a smart and structured program that can enable global performance readiness, free your mind and enable you to more easily ramp to races. And so the core components of this, almost the legs of your performance store, is number one, a realization that consistency is the magic word." Part Three: How to Build Sustainable Performance The preparatory phase - focusing on consistency and pragmatism. (32:15) "It is patient. It delivers low emotional load. But what it ends up delivering is you in a place when you are ready to turn the training focus up a little bit as having a platform of resilience. It's going to set you up to get optimal yield from the upcoming hard work." (32:51) "You can imagine how this type of training, pretty low stress, tissue resilience, technique focused, it's very, very hard to integrate that type of low-stress training into a race build is never going to happen." This episode aims to flip many listeners' mindsets around a typical approach to training by reframing the offseason and encouraging athletes to commit to a year-round approach to building a platform of health. Episode Timestamps 00:00 - 03:32 - Welcome and Episode Introduction 03:247 - 08:31 - Word of the Week 8:32 - Episode 238: Off-Season (As You Know It) Is Dead - The Postseason Path to Race Readiness Purple Patch Video Podcast and More RSVP For The Grand Opening Of The Purple Patch Performance Center Free Live Webinar - Free Speed: Essential Strategies to Help You Align Trained Potential with Race-Day Performance Training Camp - 2023 Kona Triathlon Camp Purple Patch Coaching Consultation The Purple Patch Center is Open - Learn More and Schedule a Visit Purple Patch and Episode Resources This episode is sponsored by our collaboration with INSIDE TRACKER. Inside Tracker and Purple Patch - Receive 20% off their services with code: PURPLEPATCHPRO20 Ask Matt Anything - Leave a voicemail question for Matt Learn more about Purple Patch Squad High-Performance Training Program Join Bike Squad - Don’t just exercise and work out; learn to train with our structured online cycling program Join Run Squad - Increase your running performance through our progressive, multi-sport approach to running Learn more about Purple Patch Fully Customized 1:1 Coaching Learn more about Purple Patch Strength Programming Purple Patch Swim Analysis Stay Up-to-Date with Purple Patch News and Events Purple Patch Upcoming Webinars and Events