What that bad race or run gone wrong taught you

Sometimes, you just have to find out the hard way… Here are seven lessons runners learned from their worst run or race. 

Sooner or later, everyone has a bad race. You spend so much time training and create the perfect training plan only to have it flop after all the lead up. Or, you finally reach your desired fitness level and spend the week watching your nutrition and getting enough sleep in preparation for the weekend’s long run only to get out and find every kilometre a struggle. So what doe we take from all this? Some runners wrote in:

“I learned how true the old adages of don’t eat too much fibre before a race, don’t leave your race on the expo floor, and make sure to get enough salt… My race was the perfect storm of dehydration, diarrhea and epic calf cramping. These were expensive lessons to learn at Chicago for this Canadian.” – Sandra Walsh-Whitford

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“Mind over matter is a real thing. One month out from my third marathon, I started to experience serious burnout. A high-mileage training plan coupled with nagging aches in my hip left me uncomfortable every time I ran. I was a competitive runner in high school and college, but had never experienced any type of burnout.

Going into the 2013 Houston Marathon, I knew I wouldn’t run even close to a PB and that it would be a mental and physical struggle. From the minute the race started I didn’t want to do it. I told myself, “Make it to the half, then you can walk a bit.” When I got to the half it was, “You can push through this, get to 30K then you can walk a bit.” When I got to 35K it was, “OK you can do this you can run seven more kilometres.” 

I’m still amazed at how mentally strong I was on that day, and I truly learned that mental toughness is half the battle with endurance athletics.” – Robyn Erickson

@CanadianRunning always best to cut your losses and stop your run early if you’re really hurting. Pushing through real pain is bad.

— Sherry Osborne (@busyzenlife) November 6, 2015

@CanadianRunning Also: Even a bad, sucky run is better than no run, and it makes you appreciate the really good ones even more. — Sherry Osborne (@busyzenlife) November 6, 2015

@CanadianRunning at the breakfast another runner had a shirt that said “you get what you train for” and lets say it was right…

— Victor Lough (@viclough) November 6, 2015

“I reduced my outside runs and stayed on the treadmill. To add to that, I did no work on my IT band. About 7K into a 10K, I had pain in my knee and was physically spent. I pushed through, finished and ended up not being able to run for about a month and a half due to IT band issues and a painful knee. I was cocky thinking I could do 10K no problem because I had run several 10K races the year before. The takeaway: I’m only as good as my training.” – Rob Grenier

.@CanadianRunning a safety pin to the quad does not stop cramping… But it does give you street cred w the sprinters — Lanni marchant (@LJM5252) November 7, 2015