Have to miss a few days of running? Here’s how to deal

It’s the busiest time of year for many people, and also the season when everyone seems to come down with a cough or cold. If you’re sidelined because of scheduling, travel, feeling sick, or holiday season overload, it can be easy to doom-spiral into worry about lost fitness. Here’s what really happens when you miss a few running days, and what you should do to make up for it (if you want to).

Don’t panic

Stop worrying–you won’t lose all your fitness. Ultrarunner and renowned coach Jason Koop writes: “Here’s a summary of the research: if you miss up to seven days of training, there are no meaningful fitness implications.” He adds that while there may be incremental losses that can be measured in a lab, “the practical amount of fitness degradation from missing up to a whole week of training isn’t much.”

Allow yourself to enjoy the time off (or at least move through it without beating yourself up or feeling like you’re going to rapidly decondition). If you’re sick, know that your body needs rest so that you can keep your time off to a minimum–if you push yourself to exercise through illness or a particularly stressful period, you may end up having to take far more than a few days off.

Zoom out

You’ve probably heard it many, many times–consistency is key. Long-term consistency outweighs short-term intensity. Sure, you may have big goals this season, or next month. Your goals, however, should also include some long-term plans. You probably want to continue to run for years and to maintain as much fitness and health as possible over your lifetime.

1. Consistency trumps all else.

Good, solid consistent work stacked month after month, year after year is what leads to better performance.

You can’t skip steps. It takes time. What’s that mean?

Do whatever you can while being healthy with over the long haul

— Steve Magness (@stevemagness) February 16, 2022

It can be hard to remember that when forced to take an unexpected day off, but zooming out and reminding yourself that a few days within the much larger picture of your running career are not critical. Consistency means month over month, year over year.

Life happens and illness and injury strike unexpectedly: while they may require a short-term shift, if your general focus is on consistency, you’ll be just fine. Coach and author Steve Magness says to “do whatever you can while being healthy over the long haul,” and that means if you need a few days off in order to stay consistent long-term, take them.

Adjust where you can

Koop has some adjustments that he makes for coached athletes to add some amount of missed time back in–but only if you’ve missed more than three days, and only when it comes to important workouts (usually intervals or long runs). He suggests adding 50-75 per cent of missed key workouts (recovery runs, while a great part of your training, do not need to be made up for) over a four to six-week period.

Make small adjustments and tweaks to your running schedule where you can, and don’t get stuck on minor details. Koop writes, “if you miss two different one-hour endurance runs (two hours total) you can replace that volume over four to five different days in 15-minute increments.”

If you aren’t able to add more time into an already packed schedule, don’t worry–research has shown that the body recognizes stress, not mileage, and scaling back workouts or taking extra rest days when life throws a curveball at you may actually help your body rebound in the long run.