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The Quarter
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Stride Strong Coaching’s Sort-of Weekly Newsletter, The Quarter.
The Quarter No. 68 - The COVID Blues
It has been a long time now since the COVID disruptions began, all the 2020 races we hoped would still happen in 2020 have been cancelled or postponed. Unfortunately, a lot of motivation evaporated along with the races. It is natural to feel lost when a big goal is cancelled. A week or two of mourning is fine - and beneficial - but eventually it becomes time to reassess and look to new goals.
A change of focus in training is valuable right now, especially for marathoners. It is a lot easier to train for a mile or 5 km time trial than to continue training for a December Full and “racing” it solo. The gains made now at other distances will only help come next Fall when, hopefully, the big races will be back.
As a case in point, one of my athletes made the switch to shorter work recently and set a 2:10 PR in the 5 km, running sub 18 on the track yesterday. He is loving the reduced volume and feeling fresher day to day. While motivation was low after his goal race was cancelled, he’s now seeing good gains again and is setting himself up to run really fast next Fall.
It has been a tough year but that does not mean that it needs to be a wasted year. If you’re lacking motivation try a change in focus. You may well rediscover your mojo and, as an added bonus, run even faster next year because of it!
October 4th, 2020