WSER - A short digression into habits
When I committed to the Western States 100 project I knew I would have to pick up a couple of new habits. In fact I was looking forward to this, because it would pay tribute to the vastness of my endeavor and also because I like habits. A lot actually.
Habits are essentially just things you do regularly. Usually they are a structured response to a specific situation. We all have dozens of habits already, good and bad ones, but we hardly ever reflect on how they can help us evolve or stand in our way. In running I regard habits as an absolutely key element to achieve your goals. Simply because they can help you to tackle one of the most important components of all endurance sports: consistency.
In my case I was gladly introduced to 2 new habits by my coach Karim. The first one is a mobility sequence I do before every run. It’s a short 10-15 minutes routine with elements of stretching, strength, yoga, body awareness and a little bit of blood flow stimulation. To be honest, the first couple of times this sequence really stressed me out. I had to repeatedly look at the step-by-step manual Karim had created and with most exercises I felt clumsy and stiff. I took me about 20-25 times (basically the first month of my Western States training) until it clicked and became totally natural. Even more than this. The sequence now primes me for the running workout that follows and puts me in the appropriate state of mind for it no matter if I had a stressful or subchallenging day.
The other habit Karim introduced me to is a rather small, but highly effective one: Paying attention to training hours instead of milage. As runners we all have a personal threshold of what we call "a good training week". Usually it’s a number of workouts or (in my case) certain amount of kilometers that gives us that desirable feeling of accomplishment. I won’t tell you the exact milage I have burned in my mind, but be sure, most of my friends have the same number in their head haha! Switching the mindset to training hours instead of milage is a true gamechanger. It ends the embarrassing extra loop around your block to hit a certain number. It prevents you from running stupid junk miles. It adds pride to focused strength training and makes it a real workout instead of just an annoying minor matter. But most of all it converges your training to the realities of ultra running which for most of us are not about how fast you can run a kilometer, but rather how many hours can you stay on your feet and move forward.
I feel there’s even more habits coming and I am very much looking forward to this.
If you want to dig deeper in the what, how and why of habits and how they could possibly improve your running (and your life, for that matter) I highly suggest reading "Atomic Habits" by James Clear. It’s probably the most thought out and actionable book on this topic. A true eye opener for sure.