383: A Powerful Mental Tool for Better Races

In this episode, we discuss the essential distinction between goals and intentions in the world of running. We delve into our recent cross country season, revealing how we worked with our team on journaling exercises to enhance their mental strength. We also highlight the value of mental tools and training, and how releasing control over specific race outcomes can lead to greater satisfaction and unexpected success. This episode is ideal for runners looking to boost their performance by mastering the mental aspects of the sport.

00:52 Understanding Goals vs. Intentions

01:55 Practical Applications of Goals and Intentions

05:44 Setting Realistic Goals and Intentions

10:13 The Power of Visualization

15:08 Mental Tools and Techniques

20:27 Race Day Strategies and Reflections

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Transcript

Angie: 2:04

Welcome to the Real Life Runners podcast, episode number 383. Today we're going to be talking about the very, very important difference between goals and intentions. So stay tuned. What's up runners. I've got great news. Kevin is back on the podcast this week. Welcome back, Kev.

Kevin: 2:44

Yes. You get to hear my voice this week.

Angie: 2:46

Ooh, you've got like a deeper voice too.

Kevin: 2:48

I think if I go any more towards my normal voice, it's not going to make it through the whole podcast. So this is what we're going to get.

Angie: 2:54

I like it. I like it. We're going to have a little chat. it is the end of the cross country season, and we have been talking with our team about the things that they have control over all season long. We've been working them through different journaling exercises and really helping them understand how to improve their running. By helping to master the mental side of running, because we all know that the mental side of running plays such a critical role and how we perform in our training and then also in races. So part of the distinction that we've been helping our team make over the last few weeks has been the difference between goals and intentions. And so we go through a journaling exercise with our team. Where I have them set their goals and then set their intentions. And at first, a lot of the kids in the team were like, what's the difference? I don't really understand it. So that's really what we want to talk about today and bring that to all of you, because this is a very powerful exercise that you can go through really at any time. You can use it before your races. You can use it. Before maybe a speed workout, if you notice that your brain is giving you all sorts of chitter chatter, really anytime in your life, you can use this going to a holiday party if you want to, especially if you're an introvert, right? And see the different things that are going on in your brain. But this is just one of those mental tools that you can use to help put yourself in a better place.

Kevin: 4:24

Anything that you're feeling performance anxiety is what you're suggesting. an event with lots of people that involves small talk. I really should have prepped this before the Halloween party over at your sister's house. That would have been key for me to goals and intentions.

Angie: 4:35

Yeah, but you had like your safe people. your parents were in town, so you knew that you were going to be safe. Spending the majority of the night hanging out with your parents. 100

Kevin: 4:42

percent I was just hanging out with my parents, but then other people showed up in the dark and they were like, Hey, and I'm like, I don't, I might not know your name in the light and it's pitch black. And

Angie: 4:50

in costume. Yeah.

Kevin: 4:51

Costumed in the dark. And I'm just like, Hey you. And then I had to make small talk with them.

Angie: 4:56

Oh, that's so good to see you. I can't recognize you under there. I'm not wearing a costume. Yeah. That was the tricky

Kevin: 5:03

part is, is people that I definitely should have known, but then either way, I. Small talk is not my favorite thing, but I really, but I did, like I, I really, like it's not like I journaled on the idea, but I thought about how the evening was going to go, knowing that, there's going to be a bunch of people, and I'm interacting with all sorts of them, I've got my parents there, there was, I did in fact plan out how the evening was likely to go, and what energy I was going to bring to the evening.

Angie: 5:30

Yeah, and I think that this is a really interesting thing that we can just chat about like we don't have a full out like an outline ready for this episode. We're just gonna go back and forth and riff on this topic a bit because it's interesting when you were just saying that it made me think of, Essentially the cause of anxiety in a lot of people because there are a lot of people that play out nights in their heads or races in their heads or whatever situation they're walking into a important meeting at work or a presentation at school or whatever it might be and it's They play those situations out in their heads and it causes a lot of anxiety because in a lot of cases they are imagining worst case scenario or an outcome that they don't want and that can cause a lot of pressure and anxiety and then it just causes a downward spiral and then ends up negatively affecting their performance overall.

Kevin: 6:27

And then they get actually relatively close to this negative thought that they were having about it. Whereas, That negative spiral that they went to her they may have had a 5 percent chance of something actually going that poorly But they put all of their focus on all their thoughts on that all of their You know if you're talking about a race all their pre race thoughts were like What if I get a side stitch at the half mile mark? okay It's a whole heck of a lot more likely if you think about that for days Leading up to the race of what happens if I get a side stitch at the half mile like that's the whole it's the classic You know psychology thing about Don't think about a purple elephant. what's the only thing that you have in your mind right now is this giant purple elephant. if you head into a race and you'd be like, Oh, I haven't had a good kick in the last five races and I don't know how I'm going to put down a kick today. you're not going to have a kick then because you need to have a, an intention of this is what I'm going to do. This is when I'm going to, Unleash my kick. This is how it's going to look. This is how it's going to feel. It doesn't mean that you have to pretend that everything's going to be amazing because that also has some serious repercussions.

Angie: 7:32

Yeah. And that was one of the things that we talked with our kids about yesterday when we were going into this district meet was really helping them. Try to be more realistic about this because it's true. so let's let's go through this process a little bit and then we can get into some of the details.

Kevin: 7:47

So

Angie: 7:49

basically you will start out this exercise or this, intention and goal setting, tool by grabbing a journal and then writing down your goal for, let's just call it a race. Okay. You can use this technique for really anything, but let's just use a race because that's an easy example. what is your goal for the race? Now, as runners, we have, often have, time based goals, or some sort of performance metric, number, measurable type of goal that we set for ourselves. That's one of the things that we love about running, is that it's very easy to track your progress, and tell whether or not you're making the progress that you want. Is my time improving? Is my pace improving? Do I feel better during this amount of time? So set that goal. Okay, what is your goal? And, at the beginning of the season with our cross country runners, I told them, we don't want you to focus on your time really at all, right? We want you to learn how to Run by effort, learn how to push yourself, learn lots of different other techniques. We don't, we were not focusing on time at the beginning of the season at all. As we started to get into the second half of the season, I wanted them to start looking at the numbers a little bit more and setting more of a goal for themselves because some, for some people, those numbers can be very motivating. And part of this process that we go through with our runners, especially as high school Teenagers is to help them understand themselves better. And so you as a real life runner, wherever you find yourself, what is more motivating for you? Some people love looking at the numbers and for other people, the numbers are very anxiety inducing. They don't like looking at the numbers. So a big part of this is helping you understand what is going to help me show up and perform better. So that's really when we talk about a goal, it's usually numbers based. It doesn't have to be, but it should be. Yeah,

Kevin: 9:41

but that's one of the big reasons why we have both a goal and intention because your goal, even if it's numbers based and even if you get a little like, Ooh, I don't know about that goal being out there, we've done a podcast on a, B and C goals and how you don't have to have a number. You can have a series of numbers

Angie: 9:55

or a feeling.

Kevin: 9:56

Yes. It's various things that can be out there. you. You always like to suggest for people when they're doing a new distance, if it's your first marathon, your first half marathon, that completion should be a key goal in there? Yes,

Angie: 10:07

so the goal is the distance. Yes. like the goal is not necessarily a number on the clock, but it's the distance is the completion. So if it's your first half marathon, your goal is 13. 1 miles.

Kevin: 10:18

Yeah, which is still a clear measurable. did you cross the finish line or not? we had, a boy racing today, and he gets all up in his head, trying to make sure that he hits an appropriate time on that, of what is an appropriate time in his head. Which is only literally in his head. That's, he has decided what is an appropriate time. And I said, I don't care. I need you to cross the finish line today. That's what we're looking for. I need you to cross the finish line. I don't really care what the clock says when you do it, I need you to cross it. And as soon as I, I kept repeating it, like I said, it's so many times to him on the starting line, I need you to cross the finish line. And after I don't know, the umpteenth time, it finally sunk in that I wasn't just BSing. Like I really, that's what I wanted out of him. And it took such pressure off of him. And he ran his fastest time in the season because he didn't like, because Coach said it doesn't matter what the clock says right

Angie: 11:09

and in his last race He pulled out of the race because he was panicking.

Kevin: 11:13

Yes hundred percent Let's

Angie: 11:14

also put that out there because this can be the turnaround in less than a week Because of the power of your mind like this is so powerful like in the last race He was he pulled out what at the two mile at the two mile because he couldn't breathe He was having essentially a panic attack, right? Yeah, you were there. I was I didn't see it

Kevin: 11:33

100 percent he could breathe if you're telling me I can't breathe those that's breath coming out of your mouth He

Angie: 11:38

was actually breathing, but he was saying that he couldn't he's

Kevin: 11:41

saying you couldn't and he couldn't catch his breath correctly Like he was breathing harder than he should have been don't get me wrong. It's the two mile of a 5k You should be breathing really hard, but he was like gasping for air. It looked like a panic attack and It's because he has a goal in mind. He has a number in there. He's very much a numbers driven person You But he needed somebody to say, it's going to be okay if you don't hit that number, it's going to be okay. He needed to be able to focus on the next level, which is not just this numbers driven goal. He needed to move past that towards an intention, which like, that's why we cover both of these things in the journaling task.

Angie: 12:18

And so the difference between a goal and an intention, so let's say the goal is that numbers based or that performance metric that you are measuring. The intention is how you want to feel during that process. So maybe it's the training cycle. Maybe it's the race. Your intention is how you want to feel during that process. How you want to show up for yourself, for your team, whatever it might be, right? Some of you are on teams. Some of you might be doing like Ragnar races or team relay races. So you actually have a team. Others of you might just have a support system that is there and supporting you. And you have people that have your back and are there for you. Helping you, make sure that you're eating right and getting enough sleep and they're supporting you during that training process. That's your team too, right? You want to show up and perform well for them. I think a lot of times as well. And so the intention is really how you want to feel during that process, and we've been building, on this intention piece over the last few weeks, and yesterday, before this district meet, I basically had them talk about, okay, what do you want to do? How do you want to feel during the race? I had them zoom out and have an overview and that's a lot of what we've been doing in weeks prior, and then I also had them zoom in more. It's okay, how do you want to feel on the starting line? So how do you normally feel? Be realistic. It's very important for you to be realistic. In this part, in this process, because that's how it's actually going to work in your brain. You can't lie to your brain. It's not like you're going to be like, I'm going to feel amazing on the starting line. And I'm going to be so confident when in races, you've also had mini panic attacks, right? Or had hyperventilation, or you've had that pit in your stomach. Yeah. And you're like, Oh no, I feel light and airy and everything is totally beautiful. Like it's too far away from the reality that you've experienced in the past. And so you have to be realistic and say, oftentimes when I get to that starting line I do feel a little uneasy, right? I might feel anxious. I might feel nervous. You can put whatever word you want on it. And then you can say, and when I feel that way, I. I want to respond blank, right? I will blank. What are you going to do? I'm going to close my eyes and take three deep breaths, right? And that's going to help calm me down and calm some of those pre race nerves. So you're going to essentially set a plan into effect so that when that situation presents itself or when it likely will present itself, you already know how you want to respond. And so during the journaling that we did yesterday, I did. took them through various parts of the race. I said, okay on the starting line I will I want to feel blank or in at you know When I hit mile one and see coach Brown I want to blank and so we made the prompts very specific They know they've run this course before multiple times They know where that one mile mark, they know that coach Brown is going to be there like Kevin is going to be there, yelling for them and cheering them on. how do you want to feel? They know how they've felt in previous races. So far this season, right? How do you want to feel at that one mile on the backside of the lake when you know you're going to slow down because people aren't back there cheering for you? How do you want to feel? What do you want to do? How do you want to respond in that situation? if there's a certain part of the race where you know that you tend to slow down or your performance seems to dip, how are you going to show up on that day?

Kevin: 15:53

But one of the things that was, I think, very important, especially Because of how you write this out, you're visualizing the race, but you didn't write, I want to feel this way. The journal that they were actually writing down was, I feel, as though it was currently happening to them.

Angie: 16:11

Yeah, present tense is very important. I'm really glad that you point that out.

Kevin: 16:14

Because the brain doesn't know, like when you write, I feel this, I'm standing on the starting line and I feel this. It didn't matter that it was the day before. It, your brain says, okay, yeah, I'm standing on the starting line and I feel this and I'm going to respond this way. And that safe place of sitting in my classroom and writing this down. If you want to try and stretch yourself a little bit from, I feel like I'm going to throw up to, I feel, Some anxiety about the race and I'm also very excited like you can try and a

Angie: 16:45

little nauseous

Kevin: 16:46

Yeah Try and move yourself maybe a little bit away from it of I feel very excited because they're a similar feeling sometimes you Get very excited you get a little nauseous There you can relate them to each other you can connect them and it's not that far of a bridge Don't be like I feel super calm on the starting line If you know that's not happening the Connection needs to be close enough that your brain doesn't just dismiss it. That's why the present tense and close to reality is very important so that your brain stays on port.

Angie: 17:13

Yeah, and I think that's really important because, and this is one of the reasons why mantras don't work for a lot of people, is because the mantra That some people choose is too big of a jump from where they currently are. And if it's too big of a jump, your brain just doesn't believe it. So like you say that mantra. So you're in the race and you're suffering and everything is feeling awful. And you're like, I am strong and powerful. And your brain's no, you're not. You want to lie down right now on the side of the road and take a nap, right? that's actually what you want to do. reality right now. And so it's too far of a job. And now for some people, it could work, right? this is the thing is mantras do work for some people, but it's about how believable that statement is for your brain. And so part of that is giving your brain evidence for when that statement has been true in the past or when that statement, when you want that statement to be true. And so by Visualizing things ahead of time and playing out these scenarios in your brain in the present tense, like Kevin said, it's going to help your brain practice those times and start to experience those emotions. And people are like, oh, that's just fake. And it's your brain doesn't really know the difference. yes, does your brain know the difference? Of sitting in the classroom versus being out running on a cross country course, of course it does right like your brain knows that in one case you're running and the other case you're thinking of running, but the better you get at visualization, the less Difference. It can be like there have been studies on visualization and especially in elite athletes that they go through this and they I mean, they practice visualization daily. They practice. They see themselves Olympic athletes, on the starting line and they get that Those actual physiological responses in their body that they would have like in the race, like their heart rate will increase, their breathing will increase, like their body actually starts to physically respond as if they were in a race, maybe not to the same level or intensity, but there is a physiological change that occurs.

Kevin: 19:19

I think about running the race, or I think about putting myself into the workout, then I start to get some of the physiological adaptations. you get some of the mental adaptations. You're not, your body will increase its heart rate from base level, but it's not like you can just think your way through a workout. That's not how it works.

Angie: 19:37

and this is The thing is, those things are usually done on elite level athletes. So they are so trained and they've spent so many hours. thousands and thousands of hours practicing that thing that their body already knows it so well. It's not as an untrained athlete or as like a, an amateur athlete, you haven't put in those same numbers of hours. So your brain doesn't know those things as well as.

Kevin: 20:01

Yeah, and the difference between, you still have to put in the work, is my point. For sure. The Olympians have clearly already put in the work, so the mental training is important. The mental training is important for everybody, but you still have to put in actual work. This is just another form of putting in the work.

Angie: 20:16

Absolutely, and this is one of the reasons why We've waited till this point in the season to introduce part of this as well, because if we were doing these types of exercises at the beginning of the season, we have a lot of kids that were brand new to running and brand new to cross country. They would have no idea what to even write.

Kevin: 20:32

No, not a clue. How do you feel the one mile? I've never been at the one mile of a five K. I've definitely never been at the two mile of a five K. And if you've never been at the two mile of a five K, you're not really Fully aware of what that level of pain is with a full mile to go Plus a kick on the final point one like that's the thing is You have to put yourself in there multiple times before you can really do a good thorough Visualization of it and that doesn't mean that you can't visualize like a time breakthrough like you can see some things going You also can't visualize everything going perfectly Perfect. Yeah. if everything's like I'm gonna hit the two mile and I'm gonna still feel super strong and peppy in my legs. That's unlikely. Like you have to have some reality because if your visualization is so far away from reality, when you hit that spot in the race, you're like, you're visualizing a half marathon. You're like, when I hit the 10 mile, I'm going to pick it up and be able to really race that final five K. are you, is that actually happening? if you've run multiple half marathons and you've never really felt that strong that you could just race a 5k at the end of it, that might not be the visual that you want to go for, unless you've really been focusing on your training to pick it up at that point. it, you have to accept that there's going to be a It's a high level of discomfort.

Angie: 21:53

And I think that's one of the things that gets people to when they listen to podcasts or things on social media, it's Oh, this coach said it's just a five K like I'm running 10 miles and then racing in a five K. But if you've never done that and you've never had that experience and you try it and it goes poorly, a lot of times people will say, Oh, It must just be me like I'm not able to do that and I'll take it as a personal like assault or like a Proof and evidence that they're not good enough in some way or that the technique is a bunch of crap And that's not true either because it just means that you need to practice that more you're not as experienced in Using that technique. Maybe it just didn't work this time around There are so many different mental tools and techniques that you can use, and we've been exposing our kids to these throughout the entire season, and teaching them different things to use, and we'll tell them, okay, the goal for this race is for you to go out and use this technique. technique and see how you like it. For some of them that we will then check in with them after the race. And they're like, Oh, that was really helpful. that really helped me get past this one point in the race where I, really was suffering and other people were like, that was junk. Like I, that did not help me at all. So it's different for everybody. Like

Kevin: 23:07

the one kid who let us know that mental, these mental tricks don't work at all. None of the mental tricks work, but then he started having faster races. So apparently something worked. He just needed to find the right. And it was a combination of Actually accepting that the mental tricks might be able to work. That's a big part of it But also it was a few more weeks of training like this is a brand new runner who's never done it before You can only go so far on mental training if you haven't put in hours and miles like at some point the training is required if you're training to run Say 25 minutes for a 5k. You can't mental train yourself down to 18, like it's not going to happen. So if you take it out at a pace, that's 18 minutes, that's going to train wreck for you awfully soon.

Angie: 23:53

Yeah. But if you've put in the physical work to run 18, say, even though that number seems ludicrous to me, if you've put in the physical work to do If you don't have the mental tools, you. Might not be able to accomplish that, even though you physically have that capability, but mentally you're not tough enough or you don't have the right tools or you don't have the strength built up in you mentally or this experience, the race experience to actually allow you to run that time. And so the kind of going back to what you said about that one runner and how he says mental tools just don't work and it's If you believe that they don't work, then guess what? It's a self fulfilling prophecy. They're not going to work. It's the same thing that you just talked about of, don't think about a purple elephant. And I love Pete, the people that when I say that, I'm like, don't think about a purple elephant. What's the first thing you think about? And they're like a pink elephant. I'm like, okay, but that's

Kevin: 24:48

good one.

Angie: 24:50

All right, cool. But that's part of this as well. And is believing In that intention that you're setting, believing, bringing it back to our goals and our intentions is, setting that intention is how you want to feel, how you want to show up, how you want to respond. And so if you try a mental tool during a race or during a hard workout and you. That tool doesn't seem to be working very well, and you're like, yep, see this one's crap. If you like automatically go to that, then there's no way that thing can start working for you. Some of these mental tools, Take practice. Also, just running takes training. If you want to get better at running, you have to run. You have to strength train. You have to do speed work. You have to do running form drills. There's running is a skill that can be developed with the right practice. And the same thing goes for the mental side of training. You're you can get mentally stronger and more resilient and more able to direct your attention more powerfully and with training. And part of that is during a race and during running. And then also you can do some of that when you're just resting and preparing for an upcoming race.

Kevin: 25:59

Yeah. And the person who says, Oh, I was thinking of a pink elephant. They've heard that before. That's the thing is they've heard some to be like, Blue triangle, now what are you thinking about? And they're like, it's a blue triangle. But if you've heard that before, you're not gonna fall for it. You're being like, oh, I'm thinking of a red circle. because That's

Angie: 26:19

what I was thinking of. Because

Kevin: 26:20

you, of course you were. Because you know what's coming. It's like the riddles. our daughter gave us a bunch of riddles in the car the other day. And both of us got all of them correct because we've heard them before. It's not that I knew the answer because I'm so quick and clever. She was like, say roast five times really fast. And I'm like, roast. And I know in my head, as I'm saying it now, she's going to ask me, what does a toaster make? And the, or what do you put in a toaster? And the answer is bread, not toast. But the first time that you hear that you fall for it every single time. Everybody falls for that because it tricks your brain. The whole idea is to trick your brain unless you know what's coming. And then you can't trick it. that's mental tools. You have to practice them in order to actually get your brain to come around and agree with what you're trying to do.

Angie: 27:07

And that's really the whole point of that intention is knowing your response. And so if you know that you're going to say red circle when someone says blue triangle, you're like, Oh, that you've already prepared that response ahead of time. don't think of a purple elephant. You already know you're going to say, I'm thinking of a pink elephant, right? Like you've already prepared that because you've been exposed to it. And that's part of the benefit of doing this type of work is you expose yourself to different things. Two races, two different distances, whatever it might be, and then you're more able to figure out when I encounter that situation again, how can I respond? What do I actually have control over? Because you are not fully in control of hitting your goals. Especially if it's a time goal, right? If it's a distance goal, you, I think you have some more control over that because you can just continue going, right? If you can't run, you're gonna walk and if you don't walk, you're gonna crawl, right? you have, I think, more of a control over whether or not you're going to hit a distance goal versus a time goal. But time goals are tricky because there's a lot of things, a lot of factors that are at play there. So if you have a performance goal set for yourself, You have no idea how your stomach's going to feel on race day, if it's going to be super windy that day or really hot and humid, and that's going to affect how you show up. there's so many different things we had, some of our team. some of the top girls on our team, like our 6 runners, were all sick. One of them ended up developing pneumonia, one of them was in the ER on Friday, none of us expected this, like this is not how we wanted the end of the season to go, no one expected that. That

Kevin: 28:44

was not my August intention, I did not set that intention. But and yet here it was and the team had to step up and figure out What are we gonna do about it? And everybody was like, I have my personal intention I know what I can bring to the race and I know the time goal that I'm aiming for But when they cross the finish line and we didn't get the team result that we were going for They still all came in with their intention of this is how I'm likely to feel. This is how I'm gonna respond and At the finish line. It's when it got really hard, did you back off or did you respond by trying to continue to push through? Did you try and find other people in the race? Did you use a mantra? Did you use the visualization? What is it that you use to continue pushing? And if they did, it's that's a successful race. There were a lot of smiles after the race today, considering the overall team result was not Yeah. The goal, like we missed the goal, but I don't think that there were a lot of people there that could say they missed their intentions because we've worked so hard all season long to try and actually align your actions with your intentions. That there was a lot of Success from that perspective and what we didn't get the team goal and that was disappointing. They've also, besides doing the whole set your goal, set your intention, make sure that you figure out what actions go to setting you up for success with these intentions. We've been done. Post race where it's like, what was your intention? Did you actually do the action so that you can fulfill it? They immediately did it. I think they were doing it in the tent after the race. Their heads just automatically started doing and being like, yeah, I went out there and I did what I said I was going to do, and I can't. I can't be anything besides proud of myself for doing what I said I was going to do. They honored their commitment and that was ultimately successful. It didn't hit the numbers. It didn't hit the place that we were going for, but they honored themselves. And I think that was key.

Angie: 30:43

I think that's key too. And I think that, a cool thing about when you do this, and this wasn't unfortunately the case for us today as a team, but. But oftentimes when you honor the intention, when you release control over the goal, over that time or that number, whatever that measurable metric is for you, when you release control over it and focus on the effort that you're putting in, focus on the intention that you have set for yourself and how you want to show up in that race. Oftentimes the goal happens and it's a lot more enjoyable and it comes a lot more easily and that happened for a few of the girls on the team.

Kevin: 31:21

Yes, that's what I was going to say. That happened for actually multiple people on the team.

Angie: 31:24

And boys too.

Kevin: 31:25

Yeah, on boys and girls, multiple people. released what their number was and said, if I just really lean into intention, they did, they hit big number goals. It's just that, we had a lot of sickness,

Angie: 31:38

right? There were several individual PRs on the season. if you look at the individual results and then some of the girls ran around what they normally run. And then some of the girls were so sick that they showed up and they did their best on that day. And I told the kids, I said, If you do that, I am 100 percent proud of you. I can't ask anything more than that. So when you cross the line and you say, coach, I emptied the tank. I did everything that I could. I showed up today for myself, for my team, then. There was just, there wasn't that, there was disappointment after the race that we didn't get the team result that we were going for, but there was also this level of, acceptance and satisfaction also present, which I think was really cool. I

Kevin: 32:23

think satisfaction is a really good word, because I think you can be both disappointed and satisfied somehow at the same time. There wasn't, happiness, Over how we performed, but there was satisfaction and that helps get over disappointment really quick is I didn't get the goal I wanted, but I'm still satisfied with the effort that I put forth. Cause like you said, sometimes, especially we're talking about a team, but individually, It's really difficult to control a time outcome. we probably have several people listening who might have the two hour half marathon goal. That's always a big popular goal out there or a Boston qualifying time. That's a good number goal out there where they literally just moved the goal posts on you. So that's a tricky one, but you can control How hard you push in qualifying races, how hard you push in the later miles of the half. But if it starts a downpour in the middle of your half marathon, it might be difficult to hit a new sub two hour PR. if it's super windy, if you get sick in the weeks leading up to it, there are things that might be out of your control. All you can really do is control the effort that you put into the training plan and the race on race day.

Angie: 33:37

Yeah, and I think the other, like the final piece that I want to add here is that when you do get to the race, when you are in that situation that you've been preparing for, it's really important to allow what comes up to just be there. And then also have a plan on how you're going to process through it. And so this is where you can take it to the next level is here's my intention. This is what I want to happen. I also think that there's a possibility is some of these other things might happen. there's a possibility that, my calf might cramp up. not that you're trying to put that out there into the universe, but if you've been battling an injury, say like you say you've had an injury. That's flared up throughout the course of your training cycle. So it could be a real possibility that on race day that area might flare up a bit. What are you going to do about it if that does happen, right? Having that plan ahead of time. And then if that thing does occur, Allowing it to be there, oh, okay, here you are, and not getting mad about it, not being like, oh, crap, now what? It's no, I already, I thought that this could be a possibility, and I've already made a plan on how I'm going to respond to it. Allow it to be there, and know how you're going to respond, because then when it does happen, you can just have this more sense of calmness around that situation, not jump You know, freak out anxiety mode and just allow it to be there and just keep going or whatever you're what you've planned ahead of time.

Kevin: 35:05

Yeah, exactly. It eliminates the freak out. It allows you to just be like, Oh, yes, I thought this may happen. Let me check and see what is Step A happen, what is step B that I respond with? Because I've got an exact plan for this thing. And it might not work. And the longer I run, the more of these different race environments I've experienced. Oh, I've got a side stitch in the middle of the race. Or I've got a headache that's coming on. My shoulder feels weird for some reason. Like you get all sorts of weird things that show up in the middle of the races. And it sometimes derails your race, but it's rare that it's going to derail a race the second time that it shows up because you're like, Oh yeah, I've experienced this before. And if you put some planning into it ahead of time, you might visualize and essentially experience beforehand before it even happens.

Angie: 35:56

And I would want to just add that caveat of unless you're fighting with reality, right? Like you just said, yeah. The second time it's probably not going to affect you as much it could and it could actually get worse because if you're fighting reality and you're just like oh god, why is this still happening like it's the Woe is me type of reaction of like why is this still hap still happening? I've done all the things i've done and this is still showing up. It's like Getting angry at that thing is not going to help a side stitch, right? if you have a side stitch and you get angry at it, you're not going to scare it away, right? but if you have a plan on what you're going to do, like you could help to make it More tolerable, possibly.

Kevin: 36:36

I really wish anger would get rid of side stitches, because, man, I would have had some better high school races. I

Angie: 36:41

wonder if, that's the, strategy that we should try out of, like, when you're running, if you get a side stitch, it's just you yell, Urgh! like an angry yell. No,

Kevin: 36:49

I've tried it. I've tried it. Oh, you

Angie: 36:50

haven't? It doesn't work? it's,

Kevin: 36:52

it works as well.

Angie: 36:53

the diaphragm a bit.

Kevin: 36:54

It works about as well as most of the strategies that we have for dealing with side stitches.

Angie: 36:58

Yeah, but yeah, just having a real understanding of, what is your goal? And then also separating your goal and your intention is a really powerful way for you to gain more satisfaction from your race performance, for you to feel better Accomplished and proud of yourself on something outside of just a number on a clock, or a distance on your watch. I would really love for you all to try this technique out and try this journaling technique. You can get as specific as you want with it. you can go through mile by mile if you want to. It depends on how long your race is. You're gonna, might be Make sure you leave enough time for your journaling exercise, especially if you're like Kevin and are running a hundred miles. I don't think I'm going mile

Kevin: 37:41

by mile on that one. I

Angie: 37:42

don't think so. But you can break that up into quarters, right? Like the first quarter of the race, the first marathon of the race. I'm

Kevin: 37:48

definitely not breaking it into quarter miles. If I'm not doing mile by mile,

Angie: 37:52

not quarter miles,

Kevin: 37:53

the first place my head was, you said quarters. I'm like, yes, let's break the a hundred mile into four hundreds.

Angie: 37:59

Oh gosh. No, 20. but that could be actually a very useful tool at some point during. The 100 miles like there was one of our teammates, one of our clients, inside the academy, that was a technique she went to in her first ultra marathon this past last weekend is she's like, Nope. Okay. A quarter mile. I'm going to run a quarter mile and then I'm going to take a walking break and then I'm going to run a quarter mile like that. She had to chunk it down and get her brain wrapped around the That distance, okay, great. that is also a great tool. so many great tools, but if you try this one, I would love for you to come over to Instagram DME, at real life runners. Let me know what you think of it. Let me know how it worked. let me know what your thoughts are on this and don't forget to write that in first person. I feel, and also in present tense. So first person, present tense is the way that you want to do this specific exercise.

Kevin: 38:49

Yes. Excellent recap. First person, present tense is really the key thing for setting your intentions here.

Angie: 38:54

All right, you guys. So thank you as always for joining us and spending this time with us. This has been the Real Life Runners podcast, episode number 383. That is a lot of episodes. Now get out there and run your life.