Variability

I am always amazed with how variable running performance can be from day to day.  Some days, 6:00 pace feels effortless, and other days 8:00 pace feel very effortful!

Sometimes I can accurately predict how I will feel and perform, but others I am off in my hypotheses.  I may expect to have a great run following a lot of sleep, healthy eating, and several days since my last hard workout – and sometimes that happens, and other times I might bomb under those conditions.  The opposite is also true.  I may expect to have a crappy run because I’m sleep-deprived, stressed, and recently made a lot of poor food choices, and then end up having my best run of the season.

 

The things that I think influence my performance include the obvious:  how rested I am (sleep and recent workouts), how my non-running life is going, how I’ve been eating, and if I am running alone or with others.  Of course there is also time of day, temperature, wind, and other weather-related variables.  I suspect that hormones play a big influence, but I haven’t been able to reliably figure that one out!  Illness influences me a great deal, to the point that I usually know I am going to get sick before I actually do because I’ll see a performance decrease before other symptoms start.  I also usually know that I’m completely over an illness when I get back to full strength on my runs.

 

You’d think after all of these years of running and competing, I would better be able to predict when I would have good days vs. bad days, but I still feel pretty clueless sometimes.  I know what taper generally works for me:  keep the same training pattern but reduce mileage, take a day off or easy cross-train 2 days before the race, and do a short run with strides the day before the race.  However, sometimes I’ll feel stale coming off of that taper and then run my best time in an event or workout I trained through!  How can I know for sure what to expect?  There are no guarantees!

 

I like to control variables, and my job is all about using the scientific method and changing one thing at a time – which is no easy task – but there is a lot that I can’t control that influences my running and that drives me crazy sometimes!  Any other control freaks out there (I am watching while every Type A runner raises his/her hand!)??

I will see how tomorrow's workout goes - workout #2 post-injury!  My perspective is a bit different not, because even if I blow it like I did race #1 post-injury, I will still rejoice that I could run, period.  I choose to be thankful for every day and every run!