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Hey folks,

I started distance running around six months ago and the experience so far has been awesome. It’s taught me a few things about skills development, so I wanted to share a few quick thoughts with you folks.

First, the results. I started running regularly in November. At that point, I couldn’t run for more than 15 minutes. Six months later, a two hour run is no big deal, and I’m working my way towards my first half marathon (informal and self-measured, of course, because all marathons have been canceled due to Covid). In the process, I’ve also lost about fifteen pounds.

Before this I’d been running on and off for the past 10+ years. It’s always been my go-to form of cardio; but it was also always a painful chore and it felt like it beat up my body, so I would often go long stretches without any running at all. My personal best before now was a forty five minute run around five years ago.

What changed this time around was that I actually did some research on the best ways to train at running, and I read a couple books on the subject from ultra-marathon runners (David Goggins and Rich Roll). In that process I discovered the concept of 80/20 running (https://www.runnersworld.com/uk/training/motivation/a27718661/what-is-80-20-running/), in which 80% of your runs should be easy and 20% should be hard.

The first few easy runs felt strange. I thought to myself, how is this a workout? But, like clockwork, the results started to come in. My body didn’t hurt so much after runs; it actually felt like it was getting stronger. I was pushing a new personal best every week. I even began to enjoy running and look forward to it.

It might seem strange to emphasize the importance of looking into the research and listening to experts - it’s just common sense! - but I had always just assumed getting better at running was a matter of running harder and longer and pushing yourself every single day. In retrospect, I never really put much thought into whether that made sense. And it’s already paid dividends; I recently decided to start playing Age of Empires II, and instead of just diving in, I actually sat down and thought through the optimal training schedule and created some organization around it. As a result I’ve managed to reach the percentile-equivalent of Master’s (top 4%) in just three weeks, and the process continues to be highly enjoyable. “Just grind it out” is not an effective strategy.

Another thing I started to do, inspired by David Goggins, was “embrace the suck” of running and pay attention to my body as I ran. Previously I had always tried to ignore the pain in my shins or the stitch in my side by listening to music or watching videos. This time around I flipped my perspective around and actively focused on any aches or pains I experienced as I ran.

On a practical level this was important, because paying attention to pain meant that I quickly fixed up my form, relaxed my shoulders, and started doing post-run stretching. But on a psychological level it was also transformative. I started to see the aches and pains not as things that I put up with in order to run, but as things that signaled that I was getting stronger and better, as signs that I was doing the right thing.

My meaning here is not exactly “no pain, no gain”; rather, it’s that getting better at something means adaptation from your mind and body - rebuilding muscles, strengthening synapse connections, all that jazz. Adaptation requires getting out of your comfort zone, which is uncomfortable and hard. Implicitly, this means some level of suffering is intrinsic to genuine skills development because you’re constantly putting yourself into the uncomfortable state of adaptation. So if you try to avoid that discomfort, almost by definition you are relegating yourself to mediocrity. My realization was that you can be aware of that discomfort and actually embrace it. Once you realize that it’s an inherent part of the process, you can simply sit with it and accept it, much like the Buddha inviting Mara to tea.

The last thing I’ll mention here is that I did not track my progress in a spreadsheet or anything like that, something I typically do when I start a new project. I did do some tracking via Fitbit and Polar, but that was more to measure performance in-the-moment. The reason for this is that I realized I often lean on past discipline as a way to excuse present laziness. “I ran three times this week, I can take a break today!” This time around, again inspired by David Goggins, I only cared about one thing: “what is the best thing for me to do today to get better at running, and did I do it?”

This is a powerful motivator for sticking to an activity after you’ve started, because your motivation comes fresh with each new day. I credit it with why I continue to run more than six months after starting this project. A happy side-effect was that I stopped beating myself up over missing training days, because I didn’t care at all about what I had done in the past - I looked only at what I needed to do today.

All in all this has been a really great experience. I’ve gotten in better shape, I’ve learned a bunch of things around skills development, and I found a new hobby. If you’re thinking about getting into distance running, I definitely recommend it! I’m still a newbie but if folks have any questions or need some tips I’ll do my best to answer you, or direct you to a resource written by an expert.

Thanks!
brownbear