Today is mostly a rest day, I cycled
into work (in the rain!) but it was quite nice for the ride home. We finish at 4pm on Fridays so can enjoy a
bit more daylight in the evenings than during the rest of the week! It’s much nicer in the summer when it’s warm and
light when I finish work, although I prefer the autumn and mild winter times
for running as it is too hot otherwise (anything between 5 – 15 degrees C is
perfect!).
I have been reading Dan BC’s book
again recently (Above All Else by Dan Brodsky-Chenfield) as it is one of my
favourite books that has inspired me to do many challenges and push myself further
both in sport and work (sometimes, on a good day haha!). At the moment I am concentrating on the 2nd
half of the book that shows how to achieve your goals. I read it about 18 months ago when skydiving
was my primary sport, and am now applying it to running and triathlon. Have been thinking about visualisation and
how to do it for running. I am used to
visualising for skydiving, and for those who practise it as well you will know
how vital it is to form part of your training.
You can visualise a jump hundreds of times in your mind, without the
time and money needed to do that in real life, and your brain can hardly tell
the difference! But a jump lasts less
than a minute - it is simple to break down each exit/random/block etc in your mind's eye, and clear exactly what part of the jump you are visualising
at any time. I guess it is like this with all high-precision sports (I first heard about visualising when i did gymnastics as a teenager when some of the senior squad mentally practised their routines). But how do you visualise a 4 or 5 hour marathon
(or any race longer really)? To picture each move and get every body movement clear in your mind? Not much to think about when it's just one foot in front of the other for 26 miles, surely!?
Well I have not
got an answer to this but this is what I try to do. I visualise key points of the race, such as waiting
in the pens, then crossing the start lines, the first mile point, and then
other examples might be a hill (both up and down hill), coming up to a feed station, the half-way point, the final 400m or so, coming
up to the finish line, and of course, crossing the finish line. At each point I think about what I need to
do, what sort of effort I should be exerting, the challenges there’ll be, or
the good points about that part of the run.
For example, I know that when I come to a hill, to think about slowing
slightly if I am running downhill at the time, to lean forwards a bit and use my arms as
momentum. If I've visualised doing that enough, the plan is that the muscle memory will kick in and some part of my brain will "remember" to do it even when my body is exhausted and my mind doesn't want to do it any more. I think about how I should feel at certain mile markers - not just planning my pace/targets and visualising looking at my stopwatch but actually trying to "picture" the physical feeling in my mind (e.g. I should be feeling quite good at 5 miles during a half, getting towards my reserves at mile 11, and draining the tank, aka, dying, just before mile 13).
I like to have lots of positive images stored up so I can focus on these when I am out running. It's basically a structured way of practising the "think positive" mantra! When I run in training and am finding it
tough, or start to hit a wall, I use the positive images that I have created to get me through. On a 17 miler last week, during a long, 2
mile uphill slog, I remembered (eventually!) to use my arms more because I had visualised it beforehand when i planned the route. I think I remembered to do this at the same part of the route I had pictured earlier (I saw the rugby field sign and it just clicked). When it got really tough, I pictured myself running along Tower Bridge
in front of thousands of people to remind myself what all this pain was for! I often picture the finishing stretch of the Loch Ness Marathon as this is very clear in my mind, having already run it. I even have a vague image of the finish of London, not just from watching it last year, but because a race that I did last year (Bupa London 10,000) also finished in the Mall in front of Buckingham Palace after a few miles of running down the Embankment. Just like London (without the previous 20 miles!). I still have a lot of work to do though, as when I am struggling it is very easy to let the negative thoughts start to snowball and become out of control. I then totally forget to do simple things like pace myself, run with good form or even take sips of water. When I'm really hurting, it might be a case of head down and get on with it, waiting for an easier part of the route (like looking forward to a nice downhill stretch), waving to another runner, or to just keep trying to keep the positive thoughts flowing. When I ran the Stevenage half marathon in Nov 12, it was cold, pouring with rain and my feet were soaked from the puddles and rain before I had even started. I thought it was likely I would get blisters and was pretty nervous as we got started. The weather sucked, I fell in the mud once, lost my hair scrunchie and I didn't really enjoy much of to be honest. It was just head down, block out all negative thoughts and just get on with it. Without realising, the only way I managed to block out the horrendous conditions was to focus on running well and getting the pace right. In the end, I was shocked to have got a PB!
So I am still trying to work out the best way for me to visualise for running long distances, and this will probably be quite a long process, I am not bad at it but the skill certainly needs improvement. Not just for running, but for skydiving as well - we are doing the Bodyflight Challenge again this year, as it's such a vital part of training.
I think this was a bit of a rambling post, have a cookie for reading this far then picture yourself finishing the London Marathon!
Total training
Cycle ride to work (8 miles)
