I’ve heard you charlie talk about your athletes, and how they stop the current session if their times drop from after a few runs or if they’re not preforming optimally. The thing is that its so variable that one can’t adjust it at all. When are my times bad?
We don’t need to talk about hand timing and all the variations there. But what about the weather, wind and so on. At least these are things that everyone know about and that we can all say " the time was bad cause I was running into the wind " and so you can go on with your session. But what about when it comes to the track its self varying!!! I mean the times differ from track to track. Moreover the times differ on the same track surface!!! Here comes the question. I have recognized that I run my faster times at night when the track is a little cold. In the morning the track is so hot that sometimes you can see the deformations clear on the track. For example. It sometimes get so hot that the spikes holding the block to the ground move backwards after each start that they make that straight hole in the tartan. At night that never happens on the very same surface! And the times always come better even though the weather is slightly colder and the air isn’t thinner as when its hot.
I have recoginized all this but wanted to know what should I expect. Times on a cold surface are better than times on a hot one? What about when the track is soaked with some rain? What should I expect then? You know things like that really do help with psychological aspects. I mean I can go run an 80m on 8.22 for example on a cold track tail wind of +2.0 psyched up and with a hand time that had some mistake in my favor. While a week after I can come down and run something like 8.82!!! on a very hot track, head wind not feeling well and the hand time mistake is not in my favor, while at that run really was a better performance if achieved at the same conditions as that of the first run. You see. Its so variable and strange and you know what I mean. I mean, when should I feel better after a session. When shouldn’t I feel bad when I’m running slow and should keep on with the session!
I thought this might be happening to everyone all the time and might be of concern to a lot of you out there. But it seems that I’m the odd one ou here. May be its just something wrong with me.
I get where you are coming from but maybe what you want to look at things that occur within the session itself as well as between sessions. How do your reps drop off? If your first rep is good but the second and third well down then you know you arn’t fresh. Also keep a diary of everything you do in training including mood etc so you can guage it even before you step out on the track.
But this is something I too would like clarification with - I guess it comes down to practice and coaching experience to a big degree.
i can see your points and concerns, but have you thought about the day times vs. your training? you should feel better in the evening anyway; of course, the colder temprature should help, as i suppose it’s not cold like 0, but just cooler; also, the effects that this might have on the track adds up
at the end of the day, we all have very good and less effective sessions, but training and its consistency is there at least… be patient with the bad sessions and enjoy the “fired up” ones! 
Thanks for the help guys. But I have read in an old post by Charlie that the stronger you are. ( as in better strength base and higher max weights, as I understood it ) the least you are vaulnerable to outside effects. Specially the wind. I can see that in Kim colins. against the wind he always bad compared to others. To what extent does that apply