by Erin and Morgan
This special blog post is part race recap and part snapshot of the coach:athlete relationship. I’m sharing it because I’m just so darn proud of my athlete and also because the lessons that I can see in my runner’s race recap are so important that they deserved to be shared!
Morgan is a Love Training More runner that I’ve been coaching for almost a year now. Her goal fall race was the Valley Half Marathon. Morgan is many things: talented (at running and life), dedicated, fun-loving and super competitive with herself. She had a few complications along the way as she prepared for this race. Because I’ve come to know her well, I wrote her a detailed race report with 3 themes that fit her: strong, fierce, fearless. As always, we talked about how we are distance runners and sometimes the early kms don’t feel awesome: it takes awhile for the distance runner’s body to settle in to the pace. I was really confident that she was ready for a great race.
After Morgan totally crushed her 1:48:xx goal with a 1:46:57, I demanded that she write a race recap to hold onto for herself to reread in years to come and for me to look at so we can continue to work our best together. Here are some of the amazing moments that helped her blow her goal out of the water and run a 3+ minute PB.
Morgan’s Race Recap (in normal font). My email responses to her follow in italics
Race day: Up at 5am, but felt pretty good. Arrived on time. Stretched out, got excited, nerves still there but was anxious to start. Luckily saw you [coach], increased my confidence and my excitement too.
Race time: Guns blows, watch starts. First km was good, no issues, just trying to relax.
First 5km – SUCKED. Erin, they felt terrible. And they normally don’t feel that good but this time, in particular, they felt awful. I honestly thought i wasn’t going to be able to continue. My calves were tight and paining, my breathing was off, i couldn’t settle down and get the negative thoughts out of my head. But I kept pushing. I tried to not watch my watch pace but i also wanted to make sure my bad start wasn’t going to impact me later so I kept a solid pace, though I almost threw my goal out the window to change it to ‘just finish this’.
At around 7km, things started to feel a bit better.
This was a very gutsy race. I can see that you weren’t 100% and I’ve been aware that you haven’t been able to be 100% since the rib fracture and as coach, my job was to focus on the positives and not to dwell on that. I think that some of the not feeling 100% here was the rib, some was mileage and confidence that you might have lost with the rib and some was the warmer than usual conditions.The first 5km: I see that they felt bad but I can so clearly see your mental fitness shining through brightly. You certainly could have made the choice to throw your goal away at 5km. That would have been the easier choice. But you didn’t. This is SO VERY AMAZING! This moment at 5km, where you chose not to quit, defines you. This is you: strong, fierce, fearless. This is a lesson that you could teach so many runners!
9-10km I chatted with a man who had run this race before and looked like a seasoned runner. He distracted me and provided me with some advice for the route.
12km *ish* the turn around point. this was exciting because you start seeing people double-back and you cheer and that was uplifting and distracting… other than knowing that the nice hill you will going down, you’d soon be going up.
It was this hill that i felt some bad feelings in terms of rib issue [rib fracture]. I started to wheeze and was VERY short breath and couldn’t catch it. This has only happened once before (since my injury) and when it did, i stopped on my run and calmed myself down. But, because I’m stubborn, I kept running, slowed my pace a bit and tried to calm down, breathe through my nose. This passed.
13km – I see coach! yay! That was uplifting and the downhill was nice too.
14km – Had two more rib/poor breathing spells. I continued on..
I’m glad that you found a guy out there to help with coping and distraction. That’s a strategy that you should continue to use: find yourself a man out there, lol. Your ability to work through the rib and breathing issues is really impressive.
15km – up until this point, i was surprised at how hilly the course was, seemed to feel more ‘rolling’ than I had anticipated. BUT this is when you start to see the dykes again and Port Williams. So it was a nice down hill and time to Gu.
As I crossed the flat dykeland, I was repeating to myself. “push, you can do this, 5km left. push, you’re strong, you’re fit. 4km left, push. keep pushing. you run 4km all the time. push”
15km, where you saw the dykes: I think that this is where you nailed your race and gained that extra 70 seconds to beat your goal. You were at the most difficult portion of the race and instead of letting the challenging course and the difficult thoughts beat you down, you rose up and started to push and run faster. This is really amazing race execution and huge mental toughness.
Then the hill by the Irving, hard but not terrible. Winded at the top. Then, I turned into high gear. Took my music out. Focused. Pushed. Passed people. It hurt.
Then the last hill. When I reached the top of the hill, I knew I only had about 1.5km left. That’s nothing, I said in my head. PUSH, this is it. You’re almost done. finish strong. You’ve made it this far, don’t let exhaustion slow you down now. This could make or break your goal (of which I didn’t even know where i stood because I didn’t want to look at my time).
Crowds gave me strength, though I’m sure i looked like i was dying. Saw the field. As I was entering the track, I heard my mom yell “Go Morg, you look awesome, you’re almost there”. That was awesome. 400m to go. But god, those felt like the longest metres of my life.
PUSH, Morgan, push. It Hurts. There’s a rock in your stomach, the pain is there. But it doesn’t matter. Push. and BAM. Crossed the finish line!
Wobbled over to get my medal, feeling weak, wobbly, a bit light-headed (never felt this before) then immediately went to the field to sit down. Wow did that feel good.
Still hadn’t checked my time but the man I ran with for a bit found me and asked if I got my goal. He said that I was ahead of him and so he’s certain I did. I started to relax and feel happy and get that runners high.
I went to see my mom and dog and they were so excited and that energized me and made me feel accomplished. We went to the car and decided that it was time to check my results. As the page loaded I was saying to myself, it doesn’t matter, you’re happy and you’re done.
But…. just like that… goal was BEAT! I couldn’t believe it. I screamed and then the wave of runners high came over me and i was elated! me and my mom just cheered! it was awesome. That was awesome. I was proud.
All and all – the race was TOUGH. it was hard. it was a MAJOR challenge. I wasn’t 100% and i didn’t feel physically as good as i normally do. It was tough. I pushed the whole time. Was it fun? not overly haha but thats not a bad thing. It was fun in the way that it was a challenge and being done now is awesome and having that PB under my belt. Would i do it again? Obviously.
Morgan, you seriously kicked some ass in the pain box that last stretch. The poor pain box is probably still crying on the side of the road outside the track.It’s hilarious that you couldn’t check your time right away! But what a moment in the car when you saw that not only did you beat your goal, you kicked it’s ass. The 1:48 goal is probably also still crying on the side of the road, with the pain box. Reading this part made me teary 🙂It’s ok that you were light headed at the finish line, it’s because you really took your body to the well. This was quite an athletic performance, on a body that’s not 100%. Morgan, you’re kind of entering this newer realm of running and racing where you can work hard to race and get an amazing result. You were 9th/66 in your age category and 36 of 370 overall female, the top 10%! The thing is with racing that hard, it’s a weird type of fun. It doesn’t necessarily feel “good” because it the effort required is so hard. But it sure is fun to be that good. You are that good. If you felt really “good!” physically, you didn’t run hard enough. You ran hard enough.
The end by Erin:
What a ride! Congratulations to Morgan on this fierce new PB and thank you for sharing your race recap and it’s important lessons broadly: It’s hard because IT IS HARD! Don’t give up early when it feels hard!
I’m excited to see what’s next for this bright star in our amazing sport of running. I sure do love coaching.
