Tarawera - Learnings From training
Hindsight really is a wonderful thing. Reflecting on my expectations and goals now, I can see that my imagination was probably getting the better of me. If I can just do this (insert somewhat extreme training schedule here)… I will get X result. And, to be fair to myself, it is only natural to dream of the possibilities.
The issue is that it can often leave you feeling deflated when reality sets in. Throughout the training process, I have continued to feel that I am somehow not meeting my potential, leaving gains on the table, so to speak. This feeling is the result of constantly having to listen to my body and make alterations and corrections to my programme to avoid what feels like injury or overtraining.
This is the constant mental battle of the endurance athlete. “Am I doing enough?” fights with “Am I overdoing it?” and “Is this pain the start of an injury?” As a physiotherapist, I am well aware that the fear of not doing enough often trumps the others.
Now there are a couple of obvious ways to address this. Have more objective measures in place to better inform whether injury or overtraining is imminent or, even better, have a coach who can guide you. I wonder, though, whether this would really have changed anything. I feel I have been honest with myself throughout, so would more data or a coach have changed the outcome? No doubt it would have removed some of the uncertainty. Perhaps this is something I will utilise more in the future.
Reflecting on the process to date, I think I need to cut myself some slack. Focus on what I have achieved rather than what I might have missed. Currently, we are 10 weeks out from Tarawera. I am managing to run 90-plus km a week, have completed several 30 km-plus long runs, have been largely consistent with strength and conditioning, and have so far managed to keep the dreaded shin pain at bay. Yes, I might have missed a few harder sessions, taken a few more down weeks than intended, and struggled to integrate a meaningful plyometrics programme. But, given that at the start of the year I was nursing a nasty tendinopathy and struggling to run 5 km comfortably, this is probably an achievement I should be more proud of.
The most frustrating part of the whole process is that I often feel like I have more to give. The skipped quality workouts and reduced volumes haven’t been due to fatigue or feeling physiologically overtrained. They have been part of an effort to prevent niggles (mostly shin-related) from turning into something that could genuinely derail the entire project. As frustrating as this is, it’s hardly surprising. I’m asking a lot of my body, and given my history of medial tibial stress syndrome, bone stress and reactive tendinopathies, I haven’t exactly started things baggage-free.
I think the most important takeaway from this process so far is the idea of perspective and timeline. When we embark on a training journey, it’s easy to get caught up in the fantasy of “what if”. Even with a year to prepare, my timeline was still optimistic. This might be the number one thing that gets runners, especially novices, into trouble: expecting too much too soon. Take the marathon, for example. Because most professional athletes will block a specific build over a 12–16-week period, we have this idea that this is a realistic timeline to get ready to run the 42.2 km. It seems to have been overlooked that these athletes aren’t jumping off the couch because their mate bet them they couldn’t run a marathon. This might be fine if you just want to smash it out, one and done, and walk off into the sunset with your medal. For those with bigger goals, though, slow down and have a 5-year plan rather than a 5-month one.
