Suffer Section

I didn’t include this in my quick race recap because I felt it is so important that it deserved it’s very own post.      My Trakkers teammated, GoSonja, aka @GoSonja, just did a 50 mile Ultra Marathon. Yeah, I typed 50 miles.   I can’t imagine running that far.   In her race report, she writes:

In every long run, I have learned you have a “suffer section”. You just have to know it’s coming and you have to prepare ahead of time for it. The worst thing to do when you are in a suffer section is to just plod along. You need to get into your arsenal and start trying things. Hydration is #1, suck down some fluid and see if that helps. No? Nutrition. Get in some gels, or pull out your stashed treat and down that. Then, for me, I hunt down my Advil. I only do this if I am close to the end because it can mess with your salt absorption. After that, try verbal offloading. Get out your camera and take some video saying that you are hurting. Get it off your chest. No camera? Just pretend. Lastly, crank up the tunes, lie to yourself and pretend something is chasing you. If all that doesn’t work, then when all else fails, repeat over and over in your head “relentless forward motion”.

So, about mile 39 I get in my slump…

Sonja included a video of her race in that report.   Super great, and how the hell did she film that of herself, while running up and down a mountain?   Anyway,  in the middle of the video, you can see her looking very tired, probably around mile 39!   Then later, she looks super energetic.

I loved this, of course, and I used this today at the Duke 1/2 Iron race.   At about mile 5 of the run.  I was suffering.  I was tired.  I wanted to stop running. I was tired of all the hills.  I wanted to slow down.   Or walk.   Yes, especially I wanted to walk.  You see, my feet were killing me.  You should see the blisters I have on them.     Worse than something you’d see on Steve’s website.

You don’t know how immensely helpful it was to know that everybody has this ‘Suffer Section’.  And –  that you can not only get through this, but you can get through it well – and go on to resume a solid pace!        Not just by pushing hard and digging deep, but by trying different things.    Pulling things out of your arsenal, as Sonja writes.  For me, it was hydration 1st, ‘rice krispies treats on drugs’ 2nd, and thinking about the Pain, More Pain video – “forgetting the love of my body” – 3rd.    There was a moment, after my ‘Suffer Section’, where I was running fast and free.   I thought to myself “Where is this coming from?    This can’t be me!   This must be someone else running.    Fine with me, just keep on running.  Fast”    And before I knew it, I was already at the turnaround at mile 9.5.      It was mostly downhill from there, so I just kept running as fast as I could.   🙂