A limiting belief I’ve told myself for over a decade is that I can’t run high mileage without getting injured. (I started to try once, when I first got to college, and…got injured, with a stress fracture, after increasing from 25 miles a week in high school to 50 miles a week, within less than four months).
Three months ago, when covid wiped all of my races off the calendar for a few months, I figured it was time to go for it again, using all the information I’ve gathered over the years from reading running books, and observing my training and others’.
“What did I have to lose?” I figured.
This week’s training stats of 80 miles of running (along with 53 miles of biking and a couple hours of strength training) exceeded my goal of hitting a 65 mile week (after hovering around 45-50 most of my athletic career).
Looping through trails may not lead to a cure for cancer, (though I am learning quite a bit about cool topics like neuroscience, social psychology, grit, and motivation from my self-help audiobooks), but it has allowed me to expand what I think is possible, a discovery I’m confident will flow over into other parts of my life in a positive way, and inspire my daughter, too.
And while this piece of running mileage is setting me up for a potentially excellent season, if I get so fortunate as to safely have one), it’s done that much more than that for me. It has proven to me that I can focus and get more organized than I thought I could, resulting in accomplishing more than I thought possible (at least for the disorganized, monkey-minded, stress fracture-prone me, who, even if her body could handle the mileage wasn’t sure her mind could).
Tips for increasing mileage:
only increase mileage by no more than 10% each week (so if you run 30 miles in one week, only add up to three more miles the following week)
so the two weeks up, one week down method: incrementally increase your mileage for two weeks by 10% each week, and then decrease by 20% for a week before building on to the previous weeks total by 10%
proactively schedule and self-care, such as dynamic stretching before your run, static stretching after, doing mobility work, foam rolling, and putting your feet up the wall
eat plenty of nutrient-dense food and always have a water bottle nearby for adequate hydration
And if you start to feel rundown, in the words of my Georgetown track coach, “When in doubt, take a nap“ or a day off from running.
Let’s be real – many of us stay fit because we love to race and race well. Take those races away and it can be tough to maintain motivation. I applaud people who can push themselves to high levels of fitness without racing – digging deep at the gym or on a trail just for the pure satisfaction of it. I’m married to one of those – my husband, Tim, can SPRINT on the stepmill for 30-45 minutes, sweating profusely, for no reason other than to feel fit, vital, healthy, and alive.
Unfortunately, that’s not me.
I need start lines, big challenges, competitors to push me, and people to cheer me on. Maybe it’s because Tim, is the self-confident oldest of a small, normal, loving, attentive family, and feels he has nothing to prove, whereas I’m the 8th of a big family of nine kids – the youngest girl – stilling fighting for attention and respect even as I (gulp) push 40.
If anyone out there can relate to my experience, going through a long period without racing is tough. We miss the thrill of it, the accountability of it, the celebration after it. I’ve been there – while pregnant, I was fortunate enough to be able run throughout my pregnancy BUT being able to run without the ability to race (at least not all-out) also meant I had to find motivation to get my me and my belly out of bed and onto the track or trails with no races to try win or no personal records to attempt to set.
A few ideas for getting through this weird time:
1. Compete with yourself
Create personal benchmarks, e.j. fastest mile time or max pushups
Do virtual races/charity challenges
2. Compete with others
Chase local Strava segments and FKTs (Fastest Known Times)
Go for a creative Guinness World Record
Enlist a friend in some friendly head-to-head competition
3. Take a break from competing
Do whatever you want to, including something new, with no agenda
Work on mental game, flexibility/mobility/yoga
Take an extra long off-season and focus on other priorities, guilt-free
Whichever you choose – good luck, hang in there, and have fun!
How do you stay motivated? What’s your “why”? Why do you get out of bed and take on hard challenges? Why do you work to be your best? 🔥
One reason I crawl through mud and flip heavy tires is to prepare myself for when life throws mud in my face and when roadblocks try to stop me from forward progress…
Racing helps me establish good habits, like thinking on my feet, and choosing to get gritty when things go wrong (as they often do, like when I got post-partum depression or when Tim got cancer).
Can you relate?
I’m feeling grateful after finishing the last race of the Spartan U.S. National Series in fourth, bumping my fifth place ranking to fourth. As someone who was still pregnant two years ago at this time, I feel encouraged by my progress, and I look forward to taking this momentum into the upcoming championship season!
My sponsors deserve a shout out for their support (Clif Bar, Pure Power, and MitoQ), and YOU deserve a “thank you,” too, for sticking with me throughout my journey!
Looking for ways to feel less anxious and more confident on the starting line? We all are!
Most people tend to feel nervous before a race, (even if they know they prepared themselves well for what lies ahead), and while a few “butterflies” can serve us well, too much anxiety can take the fun out of the overall race experience. Before a race, adrenaline kicks in, leading to an elevated heart rate and an elevated respiration level. For most of us, this is accompanied by a sense of squeamishness in our stomachs.
While most people dread these feelings and tolerate them as a necessary part of racing, author and running coach Matt Fitzgerald recommends we choose to interpret the “butterflies in stomach” feeling as excitement rather than anxiety, since our brain doesn’t know the difference. Certified hypnotherapist Tim Sinnett explains, “One strategy is to try to reduce that intensity of the nervous feeling, but another strategy is to cognitively reframe the feeling from that of nervousness to excitement. The visceral feeling is natural – it’s our interpretation of it that causes anxiety.”
Check out this three-step process for feeling like a superhero on the start line…
1) Cognitively reframe feelings of nervousness to that of excitement (as described above)
2) Do a power pose
-According to social psychologist Amy Cuddy, “Body language affects how others see us, but it may also affect how we see ourselves.” I think this theory has merit, because in my experience, standing tall on the start line in a “Wonder Woman pose” with my arms on hips, chest open, shoulders relaxed, helps me feel confident, empowered, and ready to roll.
3) Wear something that makes you feel confident
-When I do road races, I like to dress up in a superhero costume (e.g. Batgirl or Wonder Woman) because it keeps me relaxed and having fun yet also makes me actually feel like a superhero! According to a study by Danish researchers, this is due to a theory called “enclothed cognition,” which essentially means people dressed a certain way act similarly to the way they are dressed, described in more detail here: https://humanoctane.com/blog/post/enclothed-cognition-html When competing on American Ninja Warrior, I like to wear red, white, and blue, covered in stars; and during wet, muddy obstacle course races, I like to wear sleek, high-quality compression gear. From high school cross country runners wearing their hair in French braids to Olympic track star Alysia Montana wearing a yellow flower in her hair, showing up in your version of makes you look good will help you feel good and feel confident.
Why is confidence so important when it comes to racing? Confidence plays an important role in getting us to perform our best. It takes confidence to go out in a faster heat and work to stay up with a fast pack, and it takes confidence to jump on the monkey bars (without stopping to take a breather) and take a risk tackling them with a high heart rate.
So next time you race, take the time to dress in a way that makes you feel your best, stand on the start line with good posture, and greet feelings of nervousness as a sign that you’re excited and ready to rock your race! Try it and let me know how it works for you!
When people ask me how to get a six-pack, instead of dishing out a challenging routine of running and core work, or throwing out the “abs are made in the kitchen” line, I encourage them to dive passionately into an athletic goal that is so lofty and exciting that it will require/motivate them to train hard, fuel well/healthfully, and stay committed. In the words of super-fit American Ninja Warrior star Jessie Graff, “When I stopped worrying about what I thought I should look like and instead focused on the strength and agility required for skills that inspire me, everything else fell into place.” I completely agree. People might not find this fact satisfying, but I initially got my six-pack by not trying to get it at all. I was so busy training for a 200 miles-in-a-day bike ride, using it as therapy to get over a breakup, that one day I looked down and it was just there. It didn’t change me at all; I simply went from being someone who did not have a visible six pack to someone who did. Sure, I got some sports modeling opportunities because of it, but again, that wasn’t what I was going for. (In fact, I got asked out on fewer dates after getting a six pack, go figure.) I was simply training hard, focused on athletic goals, and eating plenty of healthy food. My body naturally did what it did.
When it comes to caring about how one looks, I feel like there’s a fine balance: care too little and it’s hard to find a job and attract a mate (if you want one), care too much and it can lead to a vulnerable sense of self-worth. I strive to land right within that balanced zone. I care about my appearance to the point of it being a part of healthy self-esteem, though as an athlete by nature, I find happiness in focusing more on what my body can do than what it looks like. It just dawned on me, however, that the last decade or so since college, my weight has fluctuated by 20 or more pounds four times. After college, I gained 20 pounds while working at a summer camp and then dealing with a “quarter-life crisis”, then I lost it inadvertently by training hard after a breakup (plus eating healthier due to having a better job and thus more money to buy fresher food). I gained it back again last year with the weight of my first pregnancy, and now, six months post-partum, the bulk of my pregnancy weight has been shed (though with no promise of a six-pack coming fully back).
Throughout this entire time period, I’ve had a large handful of people make comments on my weight. During the year or two after college in which I carried 20 extra pounds, I remember a guy I was dating pinch my right love handle and say, “What’s this?” implying it was unacceptable. (Bye, bye, guy – that’s a part of me, that’s what that is. To love me is to love all of me, love handles and everythingl.) A year or two later, after I’d lost the weight, another guy I was dating looked at my abs and said, “You’re almost too lean.” I certainly didn’t ask him for his opinion about my body and if it was optimally pleasing to his eye, but he felt entitled to give it anyway. (No, thank you. My goal in life was not to change my body according to the specific standards of each guy I was dating.) During this extra lean time period of my life, which came about from a consistent barrage of athletic goals to challenge myself athletically (from a 200 mile bike ride and a couple triathlons to countless road races, track races, and eventually, obstacle course races), and lasted from my mid-twenties until a year ago (my mid-thirties), when I started to gain pregnancy weight, comments about my physique have mainly been about my “six-pack.” They’ve always been positive in nature, though I try not to overly pay attention to them, in order to stay focused on the reasons I train that motivate me most, which is not to get compliments, but to challenge myself, inspire others to be their best, and be a part of a big, amazing community; things I can do whether I happen to have a six-pack, (like I often do by the end of the racing season) or not, (like I rarely do at the end of my off-season/during the holidays).
Why am I bringing all of this up? Because our society puts such a strong emphasis on looks, especially for women, and I just had an epiphany I’d like to share…
Throughout my weight fluctuations, from looking lean with abs to looking soft in the middle, and there and back again, I can honestly say that I haven’t found any correlation between my level of leanness and my level of happiness.
In other words, when I had my six pack, I did not wake up every morning, high-five myself in the mirror, and walk around with my head held high, ready to conquer the world just because I looked lean. I had just as many personal, day-to-day problems as I did before, (though being fit and healthy enough to race well did contribute to some fun race weekends). Having a six pack did not necessarily mean I won every race, however, and it certainly didn’t mean I was generally better or more valuable than anyone else. And now that I don’t have it, with no promise of ever getting it back again, I do not feel less worthy in society. This is not to say that striving to be fit and healthy cannot help with overall health and happiness, as it definitely can, which is why I’ve found a lot of fulfillment working as a personal trainer for a decade. I just mean that striving for a particular lean look can be stressful, especially since some people have body types where they can be incredibly fit and still not have a six-pack because they come from an “apple-shaped” family. I happen to come from a “pear-shaped” family, where I can lose all but a thin layer of weight on my belly (but no matter how lean I get, my thighs won’t ever look as toned as my upper body and core). Though it’s easier said than done, I’ve learned it’s best not to let things I can’t control bother me, however, and distract from potential life joy; life is just too short. As they say, “Comparison is the thief of joy” – it’s so true!
A common theme I found throughout my years as a personal trainer was that people who wanted to lose weight got better results when they had a performance goal to focus on (e.g. finish a half marathon or do a pullup) rather than simply a weight loss goal. Plus, they enjoyed the process more, feeling empowered as their body became stronger and able to accomplish more, no matter what the scale said that week. Even when I was single and dating, wanting to look good in a pair of jeans has never been enough motivation for me to, say, go do a swim workout on a Saturday morning, but signing up for a triathlon and being legitimately worried that I wouldn’t be able to complete the ½ mile open-water swim was.
At the end of the day, people are driven by different motivations to work out, and I’m not here to preach that one way is better than another – that’s for each individual to decide. But I would encourage anyone who finds themself obsessing over how they look and fretting about each pound to consider looking at their body/weight/working out in a different light. Rather than exercise to look a certain way; I’d encourage them to try setting an athletic goal or signing up for a race they’ll have to really train for in order to finish injury-free. There’s a good chance that focusing on something positive (i.e. an accomplishment) will actually help them reach their aesthetic goal sooner than when focusing on trying to lose ornery weight. It’s human nature to want to look attractive, so I’m not trying to imply that it is more noble to work out to accomplish something than to look good; I’m just saying that my research indicates it’s easier to hit an aesthetic goal by focusing on an athletic goal.
If any of this resonates with you, I say get out there and sign up for something out of your comfort zone and immerse yourself in the training of it so deeply that you don’t have time to analyze every inch of your body. Train so hard you’re too tired to step on the scale, and maybe one day, on your way out for a summer run, you’ll catch a glimpse of your midsection in the mirror, see some ridges, and say to yourself, “hot damn, you look good,” with a satisfying smile.
One reason I crawl through mud and flip heavy tires is to prepare myself for when life throws mud in my face and when roadblocks try to stop me from forward progress…
Racing helps me establish good habits, like thinking on my feet, and choosing to get gritty when things go wrong (as they often do, like when I got post-partum depression or when Tim got cancer).
Can you relate?
I’m feeling grateful after finishing the last race of the Spartan U.S. National Series in fourth, bumping my fifth place ranking to fourth. As someone who was still pregnant two years ago at this time, I feel encouraged by my progress, and I look forward to taking this momentum into the upcoming championship season!
My sponsors deserve a shout out for their support (Clif Bar, Pure Power, and MitoQ), and YOU deserve a “thank you,” too, for sticking with me throughout my journey!
Looking for ways to feel less anxious and more confident on the starting line? We all are!
