Planning Races without Setting Yourself Up for Failure
This post is sponsored by adidas, who make running gear that makes me feel like I’m Dame Jessica Ennis Hill and not the tortoise from the fable.
I’m a big fan of doing things for my future self. In general, planning and booking things that I know will challenge me in the future works out pretty well but when it comes to ambitious races, it’s not always the case. In fact, sometimes it has the opposite effect.
I started entering running races in 2021 and packed quite a few into the year. They were mostly shortish, up to a half marathon. Some were trail races, others were road but all fairly manageable. Because I was running three times a week on road and trail anyway, I didn’t do any specific training for any of those races and as a result, their place on the calendar didn’t really effect my general running fun.
Then I got ambitious.
No, not even ambitious, I just began to feel like I should be doing certain things, signing up to certain races without having any inkling of how they fitted into my life or how they would impact the very thing I assumed they would improve, my actual running.
Signing up for drastically different races
What I really wanted to do, was to continue racing spring triathlon alongside some sprint duathlons. Both very complimentary events. But at the same time, I also wanted to ‘tick off’ a marathon because it felt like the logical thing to do. Plus a 20-mile hilly trail race early in the season. I mean…you can probably see where the pattern begins to fall apart.
Multi-sport sprints with running distances of 5k, long distance trail running, and road marathon running – these are not complimentary things. Not by a long shot.
I started my training in the depths of winter, setting out for runs on numb feet and straight up steep hills. I had no plan and it showed. Soon, I had an achilles injury and that was the first domino to fall. My training for the entire of 2022 up to now, November, was stop-start because of injuries, recovery, then running again too soon and too intensely. I had to bow out of most races and the ones I did do, I probably wasn’t in the best shape for. It was a nightmare.
I also had to bow out of my last triathlon of the year as I first sprained my shoulder spectacularly and then caught covid. Hmmpf.
Races are not isolated events
What I realised when I finally accepted that I wouldn’t be running the marathon, was that it was a pretty mad thing to expect myself to be able to do. Training for an endurance event on road did not have the same training plan as a mixed-terrain sprint triathlon. Every time I went for a run, I couldn’t decide if I should be working on 5k speed or long, slow endurance training. So I opted for neither and just went for an average jaunt.
Races, as it turns out, are not isolated events. They’re part of the web that is your overall health, fitness and training. What you do three months before a marathon is not what you do three months before a short-course triathlon, it’s not what you do three months before a 20-mile trail race.
I couldn’t work out what my goals were for the year, so I just signed up to events that looked good and hoped for the best. I didn’t plan. I didn’t consider that my brain and body couldn’t simultaneously train for both triathlon, trail and marathon. It was easy to spend the money on the entry fees, but impossible to be in the right shape for all of those events.
The result? I wasn’t in the right place for any of them.
Running into 2023
I haven’t set any 2023 race goals yet because I’m still working out what I want to focus on, but when I do, it’ll be complimentary races. While I’m doing triathlon speed sessions in my new adidas sports bra and feeling like I’m ready for the Olympics, I’m not going to be also planning a 15-mile loping zone 2 run to prep for a marathon.
I’m also not going to randomly sign up for races in the future without seriously considering my motives for them. A large part of me signed up for the road marathon because trail ultras sparked my interest, but I felt like I couldn’t start thinking about those before I’d completed a marathon, even though a road marathon is an entirely different type of event to a trail ultra and requires drastically different conditioning and training. It’s all too easy to let the hype get to you and lead you to decisions that aren’t right for you. Running a marathon on the road does not sound fun when I want trees and roots and trails and squirrels.
So that’s what I’ve learnt in 2022. That signing up for races might just require a credit card but getting to the start line requires a plan.
