Hearts manager Robbie Neilson says only Rangers and Celtic are capable of coming through a brutal run of winter fixtures unaffected as his recharged Jambos gear up for a vital run-in.
After eight games in just three-and-a-half weeks Neilson's side have gone off the boil slightly with just one goal scored in their last four.
But although some fans have started to grumble over recent performances - the 2-1 home defeat to Dundee particularly rankles - Neilson's side still maintain a 10-point gap over the chasing pack in the race for third place in the Premiership.
Hearts travel to take on basement boys St Johnstone on Saturday and the manager reckons a full week of uninterrupted training will benefit his side in Perth.
Neilson said: "It's been a while since we had a full week because we've had four midweeks on the bounce so it's been good to get a wee bit of preparation and proper training because previously it's just been game-recover-game-recover.
"It's been good to have time on the training pitch to work on how we want to play, all the basic principles.
"We had about a week to 10 days to hammer that home when we came back towards the end of the winter break but as soon as you get into the games, it's difficult to do anything.
"I think that run of games has taken a toll on all the teams apart from Rangers and Celtic who have a much bigger squad than anyone else.
"They can rotate five or six players a game and still bring in international players. If you look at the form of every team, apart from St Mirren, we've probably all dipped a bit."
Neilson wants to rediscover the ruthless form Hearts showed in the first half of the season to generate their favourable position.
"We went into the winter break with a five-point gap and we've come out of this recent run of games with a 10-point gap and into the quarter-final of the Scottish Cup," he pointed out.
"We need to try and push on again and get back to the form we showed at the start of the season.
"I don't think we're far off it. In the first half of the last couple of games we did very well but we've not got the goals to take us clear and it's made the second half a bit more difficult.
"It was similar at the start of the season when we played really well but we took our chances and killed the game whereas in these recent games we've probably not taken our chances."
