Life Lessons I have learnt from Ultra Running

1. Deal with the small stuff!

That voice niggling away in your ear - stop and listen to it - what might seem small and inconsequential now could end up driving you to distraction and using up valuable mental energy.

2. Know where you are

Navigating to where you want to be means understanding and knowing where you currently are.  Write out your plan and mentally bookmark where you are on it continuously.  If you lose your place you can go back to the last place you knew for definite and then go from there.

3. Enjoy the dark

Get comfortable with not having all the answers.  Things do not always go our way.  The ways you have of navigating where you are may not work so well in the dark.  Relax, let your senses guide you, know that it is always darkest before the dawn.  Enjoy the knowledge and different view of the world you get in the dark.

4. Know You

You are the only person with you every second of every day - get happy with that.  Greater self awareness and self management means greater flexibility in our thinking, feeling and actions in a constantly changing environment.  Make decisions that work towards your goal.

5. Its ok to slow down

Slowing down can make a big difference.  You can see clearly what is happening around you and gives you some time to recover your energy.  This isn't about ambling - stay purposeful and meaningful in your actions.  You are in charge of how you are in the world.

6. Its ok to stop!

Relentless pursuit of your goal can be draining emotionally, mentally and physically on you and others around you.  You will recover if you give yourself the chance.  Acknowledge the signs that you need to stop, eat, sleep... stop chasing others - you'll catch them up.  Tell yourself the positives of what you have done so far - ask for help from others if you need it.  Have patience and be gentle on yourself.  Start up slowly as you feel ready to move on.

7. Be in the moment

Rather than focusing on the end goal - break it down into chunks.  Focus on what's in your immediate control, enjoy the moment you are in knowing it is unique and taking you where you want to go.

8. Either / Or, or somewhere in between

It's easy to get caught up with the end goal and see it as either we are on our way to achieving it or not.  Take a step back - you're in this for the long journey.  Targets set at the beginning need to be reviewed as we go - be flexible about changes as they happen - give yourself the space to make changes and not letting yourself stress when the targets move - move with them, let them go, create new ones with the knowledge you have gained so far.

9. Be a part of where you are

Take stock and fully immerse yourself in the landscape around you.  Experience it fully through all your senses.  This is not about looking at it from afar but being part of it.

10. Be organised

Thinking back to 'Know You' - you know what might stop you so do something about it at the beginning - have a plan B, C, D... keep to hand the strategies that work for you .  If you've already thought about what might a problem further down the line then you can come up with ways round it - if it happens then you're ready to deal with it.  This is your life and it's going to be a long one - which means more moments to deal with, more choices to make.

11. What goes up must come down

Prepare for the hard work of going uphill and remember to enjoy the downhills.  Be mindful of the fact you can get a little out of control the faster you go downhill and are more likely to trip and fall here than on the up!  Be purposeful!

12. Whose rules?

This is your journey, your strategy, your goal.  You set the rules for you.  If it works for you it's right for you.  What works for others is right for them.  Experiment and learn from each thing you do and develop your strategy from there.  Be curious.

13. Just one of you

You are the only you that's in this world - your journey is unique to you - remember that.

14. Finish first

This means you have to get to the finish line - not that you have to be the first to the finish line!  Achieve your goal; get to the end of this particular journey.  When you've done that then you can look back at how you achieved it and take new knowledge forward into the next one!

How to Turn Inspiration into Participation....

With so many people feeling inspired by the Olympics you may be wondering where to start, so here is an extract from my e-book 'How to get off the Sofa and Start Running'.

Getting your mind in your run

"There are people who have no bodies, only heads. And many athletes have no heads, only bodies. A champion is a man who has trained his body and his mind"

- Coach Sam Dee The Olympian

However much your body might want to go for a run, if your mind isn’t interested it’s unlikely that you will get out the door.

We can be very good at talking ourselves out of doing something and so when you first start running it’s really good to think of some outcomes that you want to achieve.

You can break these down from your long term outcome and then smaller ones in order to keep you on track.

For instance a long term outcome maybe to take part in a race, do a particular time, fit into a particular pair of jeans.

Your short term outcomes can then be to run 3 times a week, to do a certain amount of mileage in a week, or spend a certain amount of time running each week.

Our brains work really well when it knows what we want to achieve and so if you have a good outcome in place this can help on those days it seems more tricky to get out the door!

To create a great outcome think about what you want to achieve and then build up a movie of it in your mind, what can you see happening when you have this outcome, what can you hear and how do you feel.  The more detail you can put into this visualisation the more compelling it becomes and the more likely you are to achieve it.

By building this vision at the beginning it can mean that on those odd days when you can’t be bothered you can bring this vision to the fore and it will help you get out the door.

I have a philosophy that on any given day running can be 10% physical and 90% mental.  If you are going to spend time training your body to do what you want it to do, surely the same thinking goes for training your brain!

And that’s not just for running…..

If you want to read the whole book which includes a 12 week plan you can order through:-

 Amazon -  http://amzn.to/howtogetoffthesofa or

The Endless Bookcase - http://www.theendlessbookcase.com/shop/products-page/ebooklet/how-to-get-off-the-sofa-and-start-running/

Expectation Vs Ability

There are those times that we raise our expectations and then realised we perhaps don’t have quite the ability to get our outcome and we then know what we need to do, learn or work on to achieve that outcome. Well what happens when it works the other way round.

I was racing the other day when my brain was telling me what I was capable of and the minutes per mile I should be running. Training had been going well and I was going to feel happy to keep an even pace throughout the 10 miles. Well one mile in and I’m feeling good and check the time and I’m nearly a minute quicker than I was planning. ‘Oh dear – I’d better slow down or I’ll never last!’ So slow down I did, or so I thought and the next mile was a few seconds quicker again. I felt fine and yet over the next 3 more miles I continually told myself to slow down and that I would never last the distance, and yet I stayed within a couple of seconds time on each mile. I was supposed to be doing the first half slowly and seeing what I had left for the next couple of miles before upping the pace for the last couple.

But ability had other ideas and decided it didn’t care what expectation thought it was going to run as it felt – not following a timetable and I decided a change of plan was needed and I would reverse what I was going to do and run the first half quicker and then I could slow up in the second half and still hit my expectations….. Ability had a good giggle at this and continued to run as it felt. At around mile 6 I decided it would be more helpful to stop arguing between expectation and ability – I could put the energy I was using up to much better use!
And so I continued on and enjoyed the fact that I was running better than I expected and congratulated myself on an excellent training plan for this year as taking it slowly and building back up from injury was most definitely working. I crossed the line about 9 minutes quicker than expected.

One Nil to Ability!

A few days later was the first cross country race of the season and having run all three days from the race above to this one I was looking to run evenly and easily – and obviously expectation was putting some limits in - did my legs still feel heavy from the previous race? Had I recovered enough? Should I have run each day since…...? Luckily for me ability had an ally in that my friend Becs was running alongside (normally much faster and had done 20 miles the day before in preparation for the New York Marathon) and kept me going all the way round and I finished again much quicker than I expected especially for a cross country. So the stamina is there to keep going even on tired heavy legs and we even had enough for a sprint finish!!

Two Nil to Ability…..

My question now is how often do we let expectation talk ability out of performing and what would we achieve if we gave ability a free reign?

Moving on.....

An update…. Well running is still slow as I build up again, my body isn’t working at it’s best (having some tests at the Docs) and hoping that if I can get through the next few weeks then when I am back on form there will be a good jump in my stamina and speed….. here’s hoping……

I have to admit I did chicken out of running the St Albans 10K as I knew it would be a personal worst and decided to have an extra glass of wine the night before instead of running. My head just wasn’t ready to accept what the time might have been.

So moving forward I have signed up for the NSPCC Milton Keynes half Marathon in July which has given me some structure to my training and in July I will be running the Marston 5K which is run by my running club (Ampthill & Flitwick Flyers) a good flat race and one I have decided will be a jog round. At the end of June I’ve also signed up for the Thame 10K with another runner and so this one I will not be able to chicken out of as we will go together – strategy in place having learned after not running St Albans.

I have signed up for the Park Runs which are on a Saturday, free, 5K runs no pressure. I did sign up in March and haven’t got to one yet! Still they are in the diary and are now part of my cunning plan…..

Going back to basics

Over the last year because of injury my running stopped being fun and started to become a chore – not very motivating! Because of this I went down from training about 5 days a week to about 5 days a month (unfortunately I didn’t change my eating habits!)

I decided to step back and rethink my outcome – what did I want to get from running…..

I wanted to be outside and enjoying the different seasons, I wanted to get fit, I want to fulfil my potential as a runner (not that of an Olympic athlete, but to my full potential!) I started to imagine what that would be like and how I would know I’ve got there – so for me to achieve my outcome this year would be to run the Bedford half Marathon in December in a personal best for that course. I can see myself, running smoothly, relaxed and enjoying the feeling of achieving a good time for me and hearing the cheers of my running friends as I cross the line!

A plan for the year was required – spurned on by three runs without any pain I decided I was ready to put a plan of action together and split the year into three areas – building stamina, building speed, racing the distance.

Building stamina – March to June

This means that for the next few months I am concentrating on building up the number of runs and training sessions I do with my running club (Ampthill & Flitwick Flyers) and slowly build up my long run at the weekend. During this time I am concentrating on building up stamina and running for longer. I have put in for two races – the St Albans 10K in May and the Marston 5K in June which are going to give me some benchmarks for the summer training. At the club we also have a 5K time trail in April and so this will let me know where I am in reality, rather than where I think I am or where I would like to be! During this time I need to be aware of not doing too much too quickly and re-injuring myself.

Building speed – July to September

Now this is when I want to concentrate on building up my speed, coming from a base of stamina and because of the slow build up still being injury free! I am hoping for a lovely hot summer, which means I will need to get out early in the day as heat is not my best friend when running. During this time I will pick out some 10K and 5K races so I can see how I am doing – this is not just about times getting quicker, it is also about how I feel after, heart rate recovery and how quickly my body recovers ready for the next run.

Getting ready for the Half Marathon – October to December

Bringing all this training together for the longer Autumn runs – specifically the Swineshead 10 Mile in September – to give me a benchmark over a longer distance and I then know what I need to do to get my goal for my December half marathon.

So here I start – I now know my outcome for the year and the milestones I want to achieve along the way and some of the hazards that could trip me up!