How To Set (Achievable) Running Goals
Ok, let us start by saying- I by no means want to feed in to or put my weight behind the ever popular idea of January being the best month of the year to pile on pressure and be horrible to yourself. I don’t believe it and I don’t do it, but the reality is that for lots of people it is a natural time of year to start planning and setting goals for the next 12 months. And so instead, since lots of runners will be doing in anyway, I wanted to re-share an article I originally wrote back in May about realistic goal setting.
It’s a skill I really try to pass on to my run club members, and this January, like every January for the last 10+ years or so, I’ll be trying to instil it in to my new Beginner’s Running Group (because, of course, it’s usually the most popular time of year for people to decide to try running for the first time or get back in to it after a lapse). I like to think (and after all this time finally feel confident enough to say!) it’s part of what sets my coaching and club apart, not just the brilliant community and the camaraderie but the psychological corner stones of creating a healthy, life long love of running.
Actually, thinking about it now, maybe I should have started with “Happy New Year!”, but anyway- Happy New Year and happy goal setting, if that’s your thing!
What’s Next?
So, following on fairly smoothly from last week’s mini running existential crisis, I thought it would be timely to talk about goal setting, and namely (for me at least), how to identify your next running goal. Over the years (and, as always, through lots of learning the hard way) I’ve come to understand that knowing when and what to chose as your next goal is a skill in and of itself.
When you have built up your aerobic base and you’ve ticked off your target of “getting round” the distance that you were building up towards, you will need to decide what your next target will be. Are you going to work towards running the same distance more quickly or will your aim be to run a longer distance?
Finding your next goal can be quite overwhelming, especially if you’ve had a disappointing race in the past that has knocked your confidence. Fear of failing can be extremely crippling at times, almost choking you to the point that it stops you performing because your fear turns into anxiety that almost grinds you to a halt.
Your next goal will influence your training programme; if you’d like to run the same distance but do it more quickly, you know you will have to add some tough interval sessions into your training plan. These sessions are hard, they can hurt and at times lead to disappointment, and sometimes this can be block, because why on earth would you want to do that, especially as the goal race seems so far away.
These skills aren’t learnt overnight, they are developed over time, over many sessions, many races, and many years. Most of you have not seen my disappointments, my successes, my tears, my failures, my 18 months of taking a step back, taking the pressure off and how I learnt to love running and racing again. I used to feel the pressure so much I entered races under a pseudonym and got my best times, of course no one can see them now and I’m fine with that.
When we challenge ourselves, set the bar a little bit higher, we become vulnerable because there is an element of stepping back to square one. Whenever a new skill is learnt, for example how to run longer at a faster pace, you need to develop this skill so you become more capable at it. You need to learn not to go out too fast, how to hold your pace, how to slow down and how to keep going when the fatigue kicks in.
If you decide your next goal is to be able to run a longer distance, then you know that there is a time commitment to this, and you need to consider carefully if this realistically (key word!) fits in with your lifestyle. Have you got time to rest, recover and fuel properly? Can you maintain your work and your relationships around it, without burning out?
Your running journey isn’t linear, it depends on what you want at certain points in your life, do you want to keep pushing yourself in the pain box or would you like to ease back and take time to smell the roses? Both are valid. As runners get older there is a significant shift to running longer and moving onto ultra-marathons. The ultra-running community just love running and run for the love of running, without the expectations of pbs and results. There is a lot to be said for this, it’s a different type of running. Don’t get me wrong it still hurts and there is still a skill set to learn (how to run with a camel pack and enough food to feed a small army, how to poo in the woods, that sort of thing…) but it’s a different kind of pain.
I love to use the analogy of equating pain management to a tap of running water; for a shorter distance the tap is fully open and you are in the pain box, it hurts, it’s full on and hard to control. For the longer distance the tap is less open, a slow drip, drip of pain, the pain is there but it’s a slow feeling that builds over time whereas with a 5k it’s on from the start!
What I’m trying to say is, yes, of course stay where you are with your running if you’re happy, but if you have an itch, a small fire in your belly that won’t go out, try not to be frightened of it. Just like everything else in life, when we learn something new there will be disappointments until we get used to the new skill. It’s ok not to be good again, to be uncomfortable but to push through it, and learn how to develop and use it so it soon becomes second nature.