Something is Better than Nothing

Hi, everyone! How is your week going so far?

Today I’m guest posting over at Lisa’s awesome blog Running Out of Wine, so be sure to check out my post there on whether runners should take ice baths! 

There’s not much to recap for life lately, since I barely took any photos during our time in Madison, WI. Sometimes, you just have to leave your phone at the table and dance the night away with college friends to celebrate a close friend’s marriage. Definitely one of those weekends, as tiring as it was, that reminded Ryan and I just how great all of our Valpo friends are! 

I hinted at this when I shared my weekly workouts with you on Monday, but it was one of those weeks where life came before training. Even though Madison has some beautiful running trails, we were so busy on the trip (Ryan was in the wedding party) and Ryan and I were so excited to have a vacation that I decided the 30-45 minutes that would have been spent driving from the hotel to the trail, finding parking, and driving back was time better spent with my husband and friends. Since the Radisson where we stayed had a nice gym with new Precor treadmills, I spent each day running on the treadmill instead to save time.

Is it ideal to do a majority of my week’s runs on a treadmill? No, but it’s not like I do this every week (at least, anymore—I was a serious treadmill addict when I lived in Dayton, OH). One week of treadmill running isn’t going to derail my training, and treadmill running is certainly preferable to not running at all.

Part of the reason I enjoy running on vacation is not just because I want to check off all the workouts on my training schedule. Running makes me feel better, especially when travel can mess up my stomach. It energizes me for a long day on my feet and it revs my appetite to enjoy local treats. But I don’t enjoy stressing over getting in all my miles, so this past week, I just aimed to get in the runs that I could, but not push myself or avoid time with friends in order to squeeze in the miles I missed earlier in the week or another strength workout.

The Hansons Marathon Method offers this advice when it comes to adjusting training to your life, and it bears repeating here: something is always better than nothing.

Training for a race does not take place inside of a vacuum. Everyone has different life circumstances in which they train. Elite runners, of course, are able to dedicate themselves entirely to their training, but that’s because their livelihood depends on it. Even then, they are not exempt from the long days of travel, sickness, or busy schedules.

For the majority of us who are non-elites, there are many more things with which our training schedule can interfere. Work, kids, travel, and so many of the things that add richness to life can sometimes require us to adjust the normal balance of our schedules.

Studies actually show that a less obsessive approach to running will lead to a lifelong enjoyment of the sport. This doesn’t mean that you aren’t passionate about running or committed to your goals; it means that you are able to achieve a healthy balance between all the important aspects of life, including health and fitness. As this recent article in Runner’s World notes, runners who do not obsess about their training have a more harmonious and happier relationship with their running and are more aware of their intrinsic motivation for why they run. Additionally, these runners tend to have a more positive outlook during training and perform better on race day.

Something is better than nothing. This doesn’t mean skimping completely out on your training, unless an injury requires you to do so. Rather, it means rolling with the punches. Maybe you don’t have time to run a full 6 mile tempo run plus warm up and cool down, so instead your do a 4 mile tempo with warm up and cool down. If you’re not feeling your best, an easy run is better than completely skipping your workout just because you had speed work scheduled.

Practicing this during training will keep you from injuring yourself or mentally burning out. Say, for example, you were supposed to run 50 miles one week, but you missed a day due to travel or an important life event. Rather than tacking the miles from that missed run on to other runs, just follow your schedule as is. Yes, you won’t reach your weekly mileage goal, but it’s better than getting injured or stressing yourself out even further.

I’m not saying that you should use these things to make excuses to skip running; there are plenty of people who show that it is possible to balance a full-time job, family, life, and training, including the impressive elite marathoner Annie Bersagel. What I am saying, though, is that sometimes, when life gets busy, it’s better to do the best you can for that day, rather than stress and obsess about getting in every last minute of each workout.

While I definitely have room for improvement, this is a mentality I’ve been trying to adopt during training. Before my hard workouts, I tell myself that something is better than nothing, and if I don’t hit my prescribed paces, it’s still better to try and do my best. And you know what I’ve found? This flexibility has removed stress from my training. I don’t psych myself out about my tempo runs or long runs and my paces are better than what I’ve anticipated.

The mentality that something is better than nothing also makes handling challenging workouts much easier when we feel stressed or our bodies feel off. After several days of less sleep, more drinking, and the usual stomach troubles I endure during travel, I was not sure how well my workout on Monday would go. Rather than stress about it, I told myself just to run by effort, and if my paces were slow than prescribed, well, something is better than nothing. When I ran those 6 x 1 mile at half marathon pace, I completely surpassed my expectations with not only fast splits in the 7:25-7:30 range, but each split was faster than the last. 

 

11 miles with 6 x 1 mile at half marathon effort (7:33, 7:29, 7:31, 7:30, 7:28, 7:26). Now to rehydrate with @nuunhydration Nuun Plus! #stayhydrated #nuunlove #running #runlove #runchat #training #marathon #marathontraining #portlandmarathon #fitfluential #runfast

A photo posted by Laura Norris (@thisrunnersrecipes) on Aug 10, 2015 at 9:06am PDT

Do I practice discipline in my training? Yes. I’m a naturally disciplined person, as anyone who went to college or grad school with me will tell you. (Although they will also tell you that I’m an example of how to be disciplined without being a total Type-A perfectionist.) There’s a significant difference between being disciplined and being obsessive, and that difference is the ability to adapt and adjust in the continual balance of life and training. 

Since this post is rather contemplative in nature, I’ll be linking up with Running with Spoons for Thinking Out Loud Thursday. 

[Tweet “Something is better than nothing via @thisrunrecipes #marathon #runchat #fitfluential”]

Questions of the Day:
How do you balance training when you travel or have a stressful week at school, home, or work?
Do you stress over hard workouts?
Any VU readers out there? Show some love for our alma mater in the comments!