Modern Athlete Magazine Issue 119, June 2019 | Page 60

6 Pivoting: At a certain point you may need to do
more than just keep coming back. At a certain point
that well that you keep drawing from to stand up again
and fight, can run dry. At such a point one may need
to consider pivoting from long to short, slow to fast,
whatever. What I’m trying to say is that you may very
well be competing in a pond that you’re not ideally built
for, and in the case of the competitive amateur, it may
be worth reviewing your abilities and desires. In my
case, as I wrote above, I’ve long wanted to “see what
the other side of running was about” – the purist side,
the road. It’s not a compromise, but a method to keep
my competitive fire burning and comeback stronger.
7
Habits: How healthy are yours, and are they in line
with what you’re looking to achieve with your running?
Reviewing my own, there’s some serious room for
improvement. I’ve found it challenging to establish
new ones, like waking up early to do workouts before
the start of the day. The more I read up about the
topic of habits, the more clearly I see how the quality
of your habits will improve the likelihood of achieving
your goals (and not just in running). So review your
own habits, and decide whether they’re contributing
to your own success.
1 Synchronicity: I’ve learnt that in order to be able
to leave it all out there on race day, there needs to
be a strong foundation to do so, and the majority
of the aspects in your life need to be in some kind
of synchronicity in order to achieve your racing
goals. The degree to which aspects such as love,
work, friendship, contentment, physiological health
and belief in oneself, nutritional habits and so forth
affect your performance, plausibly correlates to the
magnitude of balance within them. I firmly believe the
more aligned your non-running life is with your running
life, the better the chances you’ll be able to deliver on
what it is you’ve been training to do. For me, it seems
the ability to dig deep depends on how deep my well
for drawing water really is.
2 Being: I’ve grappled for a long time with the
concept of the athlete, and whether or not I was
eligible of the status. As my running years have
accumulated, I’ve felt a growing divide between the
guy who trains and races, and the guy who lives life
and hustles hard. It sounds silly writing this down, but
I guess I’m simply saying that I haven’t ever felt like an
athlete throughout other aspects of my life, and this is
likely a source of weakness.
3 Motivation: I’ve actually never struggled with this
one, by and large probably because I’ve never had to
dig deep and assess why things aren’t going the way
I’d like them to. Only now do I fully appreciate that,
like your preparations for a race, you really need to
take an active role in staying motivated. Motivation
+ Discipline = Consistency... at least that’s what
marathon World Record-holder Eliud Kipchoge says.
4 Resetting: Keep coming back. Take the time to
heal. Be honest with yourself and fully engage any
feelings that pass by as you evaluate a disappointing
performance. It could be as simple as setting a future
date to restart your training, but what’s critical here
is that you find the (right) reason to bounce back. I
am my own biggest critic, but I am also the only one
that’s going to decide to get up and start again. There
is no limit to how many times you can reset.
MEANDERING OF THE MIND
All of this isn’t intended to be advice, just honesty.
If anything, perhaps there’s a morsel of value
somewhere within this post for you. I sit here wrapping
up these words, acknowledging the near end of a
period in my running career. One period closes, and
a new one dawns like an open canvas awaiting your
first brush stroke. In the end, we all fall down at some
point, but that’s okay. Just keep coming back.
5 Mindset: Arguably even more important than
your physical training, because the mind makes it
real. If I can offer up anything under this banner, its
visualisation and belief in oneself. You’ve put in the
time, now do what you know you can. Once again,
this sounds easy, but in practice I’ve often sidelined
this while building up to a race, thinking that I could
squeeze some in a few days prior. The problem
with leaving it late is you so aware that you’re not
prioritising the mental stuff, and with that, you’re
actually cheating yourself in your preparations.
Leading up to my best performances, I recall using a
simple strategy that involved using the taper period
to fully engage with my mindset, using time during all
those slower runs to kind of mediate through the race
course, how I was going to navigate it, and how I’d
be feeling throughout. Sounds funny, but come race
day, you’ve almost convinced yourself that it’s actually
going to unfold in that manner.
Lucas R Adams (@lucasradams) is the Editor-in-Chief of the FKTseries project and shares personal ‘long-reads’ on the philosophical aspects on running and
life. Follow him on Strava.
60
ISSUE 119 JUNE 2019 / www.modernathlete.co.za
courtesy Lucas
I’ve reflected upon this patch in my running ‘career’
by offering up a few thoughts on what I believe to be
some of the crucial elements to performing well.