Why I won't be setting a running goal in 2021

This December 31st, we didn't so much welcome in the new year as kick the old one firmly up the arse and shove it out the door. As years go, 2020 was an absolute stinker for us all. At its very worst it tore families apart and irreparably damaged lives, it stopped us from working - or transformed us into muted Zoom zombies - and, although minor in comparison, it wiped the running calendar clean for us all. Which is exactly why I am refusing to set myself any kind of a running goal for 2021.

I was lucky. My family and I have so far managed to steer clear of coronavirus, I have remained in work throughout the pandemic and we do not live in a town overrun with covidiots. Nevertheless, 2020 took its toll in other ways. It provided unexpected challenges in the form of home schooling (an experience that reaffirmed my decision not to pursue a career in teaching), it redefined the term 'social life' to mean 'waving at neighbours once a week while banging saucepans in the street' and it brought the cancellation of organised running events across the land.

Early on in the year, as it became clear that I would not be taking part in any races and that 'mass participation' would mean a socially-distanced run with three or four club mates, if I was lucky, I set myself the goal of reaching 1,000 miles by the end of 2020. I had achieved this the preceding year and was fairly confident I could do so again, but with 250KM to go I picked up an injury that ruled me out for two months and brought a very 2020 end to my running year.

However, failing to reach my running target has given me time to think about the whole concept of setting targets in the first place. Why do we do it? Whether it's to complete a set distance, to take part in a particular number of races or to beat the benchmark Strava figures from the preceding year, all we're actually doing is applying pressure to ourselves. Yes, goals can be motivating, but at the same time they can become all consuming and take your focus away from the reason why you're running in the first place.

This is why I've decided to be utterly ambitionless in 2021 when it comes to running. The past year has shown us just how unpredictable life can be, so I'm looking forward to going into the next one with no goal in mind. Whatever I achieve will be a bonus, but my primary motivation is simply to enjoy my running again, to be thankful that I can run, to avoid injuries and see where the roads and trails take me.

I'm looking forward to running on my own during the lockdown times and with club friends once we're allowed to meet again. I'm going to run long or run short, depending on my mood, not on what any training plan or Strava statistics are telling me and I'm going to discover routes I've never run before on  runs where I have no distance or time in mind. 

So, good riddance 2020 and here's to a relaxed and enjoyable running year ahead. No pressure, no goals. Let's just see where the trails take us. 

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Do you run in kilometres or miles?

A little while ago I ran a simple, Saturday-night Twitter poll that inadvertently divided the running community into two passionately distinct camps; those who loyally run in kilometres and those who incomprehensibly run in miles.

I was certain upon undertaking the aforementioned social media survey that the vast majority of the world's runners would confirm their metric allegiance. However, with echoes of the Star Wars universe, the rise of the Imperial masses seems to have overpowered the rebellious metre masters. Those running in kilometres are in the minority as milers, it transpires, now dominate the world's Strava metrics. Kilometre-runners are the Ewoks to the Mile-runners Stormtroopers.

This result surprised me, to say the least. As someone who has always run in kilometres, I unconsciously map and measure every run in this way. I have my favourite 5K and 10K routes, I mentally map my long runs with around 15-20KM in mind, I'm happy if my pace averages anything below a five minute kilometre and my goals are all metrically-minded. 

Changing to miles is something I have never even contemplated and the thought of heading out for a quick three miles, instead of 5K, just does not compute with my brain. I have no concept of what a good mile pace would be and setting my weekly, monthly and annual goals in miles would be as alien as asking me to type this post in Spanish.

But running is a strange world, where kilometres and miles live oddly side-by-side. Our shorter races are always run in kilometres - the 5K and 10K bread and butter - while our longer races are always run in miles - the 13.1 mile half and the 26.2 mile marathon. No one thinks of a marathon as 42.19 kilometres and no one approaches a 10K thinking of it as 6.2 miles.

While training for the marathon, I ran more to time than I did to distance, but I still measured the runs in kilometres. Indeed, I believe the link between time and distance is the reason why runners are so loyal to one measurement over the other. Whether you run in kilometres or miles, if you have done so for a prolonged period of time, your body knows how long one unit of that measurement is. You become so familiar with the distance that, on those days when, heaven forbid, your watch battery has died, you can guesstimate how far you've run with relative accuracy. Like a natural odometer, your legs record a tally that is unconsciously recorded in your brain in either kilometres or miles.

Of course, for me, as someone who runs exclusively in kilometres, my brain has blessed me with the added complication of hypocritically computing all non-running distances in miles. I drive in miles, I travel on trains and in planes in miles, and I measure points on a map in miles. Ask me to do any of these things in kilometres and my brain simply shuts down, in much the same way as it does whenever my children ask me anything vaguely scientific; Dad, why's the sky blue? Dad, what's the difference between fog and mist? Dad, why do you sweat like a horse when you run?

So, what is the right unit with which to measure your running accomplishments? The answer, of course, is kilometres, and here is my justification; You get more of them in every run, meaning that the clocking up of KMs - and the reassuring buzz of your watch as you pass each one - provides a more frequent psychological boost to the average runner. Furthermore, kilometres are made up of metres, a simple unit of measurement that anyone who has ever sword fought with metre-rulers at school will be familiar with. The fact that there are a thousand metres in a kilometre is also simple to compute. Feet, inches and miles, however, are an entirely different and bewildering kettle of fish. How many of you know how many feet there are in a mile (no clues, you'll have to look it up)? And how many running tracks on earth are measured in feet over metres? Precisely none. 

With pun fully intended, this is a debate that will run and run. However, while I respect those of my fellow runners whose allegiance is imperially-driven, I'm proud to be a kilometre Ewok. After all, remember what happened to the Stormtroopers on Endor?

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Strava's depressing truths for injured runners

Strava's depressing truths for all those who are injured

Logging on to Strava at the moment is a pretty depressing experience. When I upgraded to a premium account a few months ago, I did so in order to delve head first into the statistics of my running life, to analyse individual runs and to monitor my fitness and progress over time. What I didn't envisage was the prospect of getting injured and being presented with a demoralising daily assessment of my declining fitness. 

Opening the app today is, indeed, a lot like watching the news. I am shown a variety of graphs that deliver nothing but bad news. The line graph depicting my monthly fitness, for instance, has plummeted like the value of the travel industry in the wake of the coronavirus, while my monthly activities graph just reminds me how little I've done this month compared to last. My training log is empty and my weekly intensity graph is showing single digit figures, meaning that my training is on a par with a 90-year old.

So Strava and I aren't getting on at the moment. We have fallen out and, like Rachel and Ross from Friends, are now officially on a break.

I'm four weeks into my eight-week enforced hiatus and it's a struggle at the moment to find the positives from the situation. But there are a couple; being injured and seeing your fitness fall off a cliff does at least give you time to consider what your comeback might look like. Yes, the graphs are all pointing downwards at the moment, but therein lies a future challenge. How long will it take me to get back to my previous fitness level? This is oddly something that I am looking forward to discovering and, for which, I am prepared to forgive Strava for its weeks of betrayal.

Then there's the plank. Over the past few weeks I have been attempting to lengthen the amount of time I can plank for, and it's going well (more on that in a future post), despite my children's best attempts to put me off. But other than that, the positives are pretty thin on the ground. 

Not running, day after day and week after week, is incredibly hard. I definitely feel that my mental health has taken a bit of a kicking; I'm moodier, I'm irritable, my patience is wafer thin, I feel uninspired with my work and I feel more tired, more often. It has also given me a terrifying glimpse into what life in the long term might be like without running. What if I don't recover from this Achilles injury? What if that's it?

It doesn't bear thinking about. I can't spend the rest of my days on an exercise bike. 

So there's nothing for it. I have got to grit my teeth, get on with the next four weeks, ease myself back into it slowly and set my sights on a comeback goal for 2021.

Here's to one upwards curve that I'm looking forward to seeing next year.

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Running backwards - Why running your favourite run in reverse works wonders

I am a creature of habit. I like my tea and toast in the morning, I sit in the same seat on the sofa to watch TV and I run the routes I am most familiar with, most of the time. It's boring, predictable and like being trapped in my own version of Groundhog Day, which is why I decided to try something radical when I strapped on my trainers last night, something that would push me out of my comfort zone and help me to cast off the shackles of routine.

I was going to run my usual route, but in reverse!

You only have to cast your eyes over my Strava run record to see that I have a handful of routes that I love. I enjoy testing myself on the segments I know so well and take comfort from knowing the routes like the back of my hand. I run these routes on autopilot, every turn, every hill, every crossing, junction, pavement and trail, they are all so familiar and require no thought whatsoever. However, I always run them the same way, starting and finishing at the same point and sticking rigidly to the clockwise or anti-clockwise routes I have always taken. Until yesterday.

Throwing caution to the wind, with the kind of careless abandon usually reserved for those rare occasions I choose Shreddies over muesli , I decided that I would run an ultra-familiar 45 minute route the wrong way.

So I set off, turning left at the end of my road instead of right, and so began an entirely new run. It was genuinely liberating, every road seemed different, every hill became a descent and every descent a climb, I noticed houses, gardens, roads and scenery that I had never registered before. I was seeing my home town and the roads I knew so well in an entirely new light. The route was the same, but the run was a true first.

The bizarre thing, however, was that running in reverse added around a minute to my time. I can only put this down to the fact that I was taking in my surroundings more and concentrating on where I was going, which suggests, of course, that familiarity makes you faster.

But it wasn't about time last night, I felt like I'd discovered a new route, and it felt great. So next time you set out on your favourite run, turn around and go the other way, you won't regret it.