Taper

Definition: "the practice of reducing exercise in the days just before an important competition".

Also the period where everything in your body aches, you get niggles in places you don't know niggled and you have a pathological fear of being crushed by a tourist's suitcase as it goes falling down an escalator.

A period of spending much money buying kit, eating food, purchasing things to play with and do after the race.

A period of tiredness and laziness.

Below: a Malaysian tapir. Not dissimilar to myself, a Malaysian, tapering.