Your Slow is My Fast

Why Pace is Always Relative

In my articles, I often give pace and distance details to describe my running experiences. I always have a slight feeling of uneasiness in my stomach when I do so. I'm afraid it might trigger unpleasant feelings in readers. What do I mean by that?

Compare and Contrast

One of the most positive aspects of running is its simplicity. This applies not only to the act of running itself, but also to its measurability. The dimensions of time and distance are the same for everyone and make us all equal. At the same time, it creates endless opportunities to compare ourselves to others. Unfortunately, this comparability has its downsides.

One person's great success is another's unfulfilled dream. Worse, the vastly different abilities of runners can lead to completely skewed assessments of race or training results. Of oneself and of others. How? One runner's race pace could be another's warm-up. One runner's easy jog might be another's all-out effort. And everything in between.

(Same but different, Photo by Stephan Wieser)

When Feelings Run High

In addition, all of these numbers and values on their own are highly emotional for us.

It makes a big difference whether the first digit on the watch is a 6, a 5, a 4, or a 3 (okay, for some people it's even a 2 to the left of the colon). Just as we strive to break magical time barriers in competition, it is almost as important to us in training.

It's all constructed. It's all in our heads. And yet it means the world to us. This desire emotionally charges virtually every pace a human can run and inflates it to much more than it actually is.

When we read a race report, a training guide, or simply a Strava posting from another runner, it immediately triggers something in us. At best, it evokes recognition and shared joy. At worst, it triggers envy, disappointment, and self-doubt.

The Conflict

I really don't want to conjure such feelings with my writing. I have tried to just leave the pace and distance information out of my articles. It didn’t work. The stories lose their context and their reference to my personal running life. Mostly because I am also emotionally triggered by such numbers and data. In some cases, they are inextricably linked to my narrative, such as the many times I wrote about fulfilling my dream of running a marathon in under 3 hours.

The Rectification

So here we are. This post was written out of a desire to counter or defuse the emotionalization of pace and distance data in my writing. It's a kind of disclaimer that I can always link to. The core message is the following:

Everything I write about my running can be applied one-to-one to all other fitness and ability levels and running worlds. We all share the same emotions, thoughts, and physical sensations. Running is what it does to us, not what we upload to Strava.

There is no good, no bad, no better or worse. Strictly speaking, there is not even a "faster" or “slower” because there is always someone faster and there is always someone slower.

We all fight the same battle, experience the same defeats, and celebrate the same triumphs. As runners, we are one.

(Lonely stadium loops)

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Everything Not Running

I'm only slowly getting used to cycling, for reasons we all know. I alternate between outdoor and indoor rides, although I find the latter much more difficult. Yesterday I even crashed on an indoor ride. I had to give it up.

I realized that it's been a long time since I failed at sports. Of course, if someone wrote me 1000 intervals at 3:00 min/km, I wouldn't have a chance. That's just not my pace. You usually try to set the harder training stimuli right at the edge of what is possible. In the case of the "Road To Sky" workout in the very popular Zwift world, my coach seems to have overestimated me. Or maybe not?

During the session, which in a nutshell is just a single 1000m climb, I realized after just a few minutes that this was going to be a tough one. The miles just didn't seem to go by and every turn on the bike felt like lifting weights - only with my legs. My heart rate was in the threshold range, which is normally not a problem when running, but on the bike it felt unreal. My muscles were theoretically capable of doing what I wanted them to do, but in practice they were getting harder and harder to control. And when the thought "500 vertical meters is pretty good, let's call it a day" popped into my head, I couldn't get it out until I threw in the towel after just over 600 vertical meters.

Maybe I could have finished the workout. If I had concentrated. If I had trusted my body. If I had welcomed the discomfort with open arms. And, of course, if I hadn't done 45 minutes of strength training beforehand, if my stationary bike was better, and if I had click pedals. No post about personal failures without a catalog of excuses ;-)

Anyway, it was a "good" experience to fail. A mixture of "on the bike I have nothing to lose but a lot to gain", humility and hope.

This important lesson was one of many to come in the next few months on my comeback from injury.