See Sarah Run

It’s not like you’re going to PR or something.

That was a little bit of a mantra as I got ready for my first race back, after a long term bout of plantar fasciitis. The Old Wethersfield 5K was my first race ever in 2009 and it seemed appropriate to make it sort of a comeback race this year. But I am really barely running, less than 20 miles a week and no speed work unless you count strides. Still, I haven’t raced since the Hartford Half in October 2016, so I kind of wanted to just knock the rust off. Coach Mick said as soon as I could string together three consecutive miles, I could sign up for a 5K and I decided to go for it. I really don’t like 5Ks so I don’t run many of them. They are painful in all the wrong ways and they don’t take long enough to justify eating very much afterwards. But it’s really been a long time. Part of me wants to collect a zillion medals this fall. I also wanted to get the first race out of the way. To see if I still remember how to do this and also see about racing with a new coach.

Coach Mick’s main piece of advice was to have fun. Also, he reminded me that getting to the starting line is a huge win. SO very true and not something I have managed to do in 10 months so I promised myself to appreciate it. I also consulted with Coach Cupcake the night before the race. We talked through a couple of potential race plans and some goals beyond “have fun”. Probably most importantly it gave me something to think about and kept my brain busy.

The Incredible Mervus and Rose came to the race with me. I was so grateful not to be alone. It’s just been a long time since I raced and I wasn’t sure how I was going to feel. It turned out to be a big mix. The race atmosphere is so exciting and fun and it didn’t feel nearly as strange as I expected. On the other hand, I was so nervous that I could hardly manage the stupid safety pins to get my bib pinned on.

I always think it’s good to set some race goals you can be pretty damn sure you’re going to hit so one of mine was to actually do a real warm-up. I know warming up is important, especially for a 5K that is going to be over really fast. But it sometimes still makes me feel like kind of a poser to go run a mile and do some drills before a race. I do way better and feel much less poser-ish with a list of instructions so I asked Coach Mick to just tell me what to do and I did it. First goal accomplished!

I decided not to use the pace function on my watch for this race. This is a big deal for me because I am a serious watch hound. I’m a member of Tina Muir’s FaceBook group, Running 4 Real, and Tina is very in favor of running by effort. No watch, no information about pace. I have resisted this movement, claiming that I don’t get worked up when my watch says something weird, that the watch can be a great tool for not going out too fast, that I know how to adjust for heat or other conditions, etc. But I was curious about “#nowatchme” as Tina’s group calls it. I also know I tend to be on the conservative side when racing, preferring not to risk blowing up. I’ve done lots of cross training, but I had no idea how that would translate to running. I had only a vague notion of an appropriate pace or a target finishing time, though I was pretty sure I could run a sub-28 minute race and maybe in the low 27s on a good day. I mentioned to Coach Mick that I was thinking of taping my watch and he suggested just turning off the pace function would be simpler. Ha, simpler yes, but more of a commitment because part of me clearly intended to rip the tape off mid-race. Instead, after the warm-up, I turned the pace function off.

Rose remembers how to photobomb and steal hats!

After warming up, I found the Incredible Mervus and Rose. The Retiree from Sub30 had also arrived and I said hi to him. More hugs and then it was time to line up! I thought I might cry at the starting line, but I didn’t. I got some chills and a serious sense of déjà vu when they sang the national anthem. But I also felt like, this is something I more or less know how to do. Then the gun went and off we went.

The start was really congested and I was happy I couldn’t see my pace because it actually would have annoyed me to be that bogged down in the beginning, but I figured I was avoiding the issue of going out too fast. I tried to just stay in the moment, remembering to have fun and enjoy being able to run again and even race, listening to everyone’s footfalls and then turning on my music. I ran what I would call comfortably fast for the first mile.

Then I saw the red numbers of the first mile marker ahead. I knew my watch would give me splits even with the pace function off but I had forgotten about mile markers. As I got closer, my eyes must have bugged out of my head. That first number looked like a 7? That could not be right? Then I had one of those weird space-time continuum moments where time slows down and your brain speeds up and you have a whole series of thoughts in a flash of a second. Mine went something like:

That sign seems to say 7:XX, but that cannot be right. Maybe the mile marker thing is broken. Ok, it’s probably not broken, but maybe it’s that thing where you aren’t right on the starting line and the clock is going so your time is wrong. But no – that gives you a mile marker time that is slower not one that is faster and there is no way I just ran the first mile of this race at a sub-8 minute pace. Unless…..buzz from the watch and 7:57 split time……Oops. I totally did. Fuck. That is way too fast. That’s exactly what I told Coach Cupcake I would not do. Wow, the rest of this race is going to suck. I am totally going to blow up here. Ok, that’s ok, I have a great support system and I will be disappointed to blow this, but everyone makes mistakes. I have a great coach who will help me figure out how to do this better. Everyone screws up a 5K now and then so it’s just my turn, not the end of the world…..But then I thought, wait, how do you actually feel? Cause this whole #nowatchme thing is supposed to be about listening to your body, not the clock, so what is your body saying to you? I think it’s saying, you are running comfortably hard but the emphasis here is still very much on comfortable and you are totally fine. You could run faster, though that might not be wise. Can you stay at this pace for awhile? For sure. For two more miles? I have no idea. Well, let’s find out. Don’t slow down, just hold this.

That whole thought process probably took about two seconds. I just kept running and I was now thinking about two things. First, somewhere in the second mile is that crazy hairpin turn, but I have no idea where. Maybe I should have looked at the course map after all? And second, Coach Mick sent me that thing about actual effort versus perceived effort and at some point, this is genuinely going to start to hurt, but I wonder when that is going to happen? Then I went through the hairpin turn and I think it’s a little bit uphill after that so I figured I was slowing down. Well, so much for my glorious goal of negative splitting the race, but I was still feeling pretty good. More than anything else – this is where I almost walked off the course in disgust last year. I was super glad to be running only the 5K this year, and overjoyed not to be so damn miserable. Then suddenly there was the next mile marker and my watch buzzed and said 7:59 for the second mile. What?? Two seconds does not really count as slowing down. What the heck is going on?

I was pretty sure it was going to start hurting pretty soon and that was correct. But I was also together enough mentally to be able to add something like 8+8=16 and if I ran a 10 minute third mile, that still is 8+8+10=26, way faster than I had been hoping for. A little voice in the back of my head said something like, it’s not like you’re going to PR or something, but you are putting together a pretty decent race here. All you have to do at this point is not blow it. Just hang on to whatever you can manage.

I don’t look pretty when I race, haha!

I count in my head when things get hard but the rules are, no counting until the final mile. So now one part of my brain started counting, and the other part was saying, ok, you are counting breaths, not steps, so things are not as bad as they might be. Count to 50. Count to 50 again. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Then it got quite hard, but finally at 2.86, there is the finish line, try to run a little faster! The surface switches to gravel and goes a little uphill at the end, so faster was not happening. But the clock at mile three said 24:XX so that meant a PR was not just possible, but likely at this point. WHAT?? How is this happening? No idea, but just go with it! I saw Mervus and Rose yelling for me as I came around the corner and finally crossed the finish line. I got water and a medal and found my gang and had some sweaty hugs. The Retiree checked my old PR in the sub30 goes sub25/sub2 PR sheet, and there it was: 25:24. I went to the results tent to be sure: new PR, 25:08!

I have so many thoughts about this race that I am still processing them. Clearly all the cross training and strength training paid off. All those early morning swims, hours spent on the video bike, regular sessions at the gym – totally and completely worth it. I know that old 5K PR was pretty soft – ripe for the taking – but still! A PR in the first race back is incredible and was totally unexpected. To me, this is huge evidence that #nowatchme is a great idea even though I still can’t get my head around it completely. The very best pie-in-the-sky goal I would have set for myself would have been around 26:50. If I had been able to see my pace on the first mile, I would have panicked and slowed down for sure. I still can’t imagine running longer distances without a watch, but I think I am willing to try it. Furthermore, I think I am discarding my previous stance of “5Ks are evil and suck”. This race was pretty fun! It was definitely the best I have ever felt while racing a 5K.

The rest of the day was also pretty damn fantastic. I got to celebrate with the Incredible Mervus and Rose. I did a mile cool down, some stretching, and my post-run foot care [another goal accomplished, CHECK!]. I was walking over to meet the Retiree at the awards ceremony so we could go for brunch and THEY CALLED MY NAME! Because I freaking placed! Third in my age group! I got a nice pint glass to take home and had an awesome brunch with the Retiree and his family. I spent the afternoon at Teacher Runner’s end of the summer pool party with my running girls. Rose says her “Best Day Ever” was the day the queen brought her on stage at the renaissance festival and she got to lead the parade. But this might have been my best day ever. Happy happy runner girl.

With Retiree. Running friends are the best!

I am going to offer up a series of blog posts about my experience dealing with plantar fasciitis for the last year or so. A kind of account of remedies attempted and lessons learned. I get asked how to deal with PF a lot and maybe it will be helpful to have my rather extensive answer in a document somewhere. If this helps anyone deal with this malady, I will be so pleased. But please, dear readers, remember that I am not a (medical) doctor. I can only write from my own experience and what I have learned from reading about and treating this scourge.

I want to share one resource right off the bat. Research is part of my job, of course, and I can research plantar fasciitis just like I research German politics. After reading pretty much everything I could get my hands on, I do have one particular source to recommend. You have to pay for it, but it’s well worth the $20. For me, that is less than one co-pay for a physical therapy appointment. I don’t want to let on how many research hours I spent on the plantar fasciitis project, but suffice it to say, quite a few. At the end of the day, I’d recommend this source, which is basically an e-book. It’s well-written, comprehensive, and backed by scientific research:

https://www.painscience.com/tutorials/plantar-fasciitis.php

If you read that e-book, you don’t really need my blog posts, but sometimes it’s helpful to hear about a particular person’s journey and the e-book is pretty long (not that I am exactly known for brevity…). So, today I’ll give a little bit of my background and some know-your-enemy type information. Next time around, I’ll talk about Front Line Assault Measures.

I dealt with plantar fasciitis for the first time back in 2009 before I even started running. It took a long time – about nine months – but I eventually emerged triumphant. I managed to give myself plantar fasciitis by rocking newborn Rose to sleep while standing barefooted on a hard cement floor in a hot Berlin apartment with no air conditioning. I eventually got rid of it and I was able to start running the following spring. I had a lot of patience and it turns out patience is a critical weapon in this war. But I hadn’t started running yet so I didn’t know what I was losing.

This most recent battle with plantar fasciitis also has its origins in Berlin. Who knew that city would turn out to be so hazardous to your feet? In July 2016, I arrived in Berlin for a month of research with the whole family. We brought everything a family of four could need and I threw in a couple of pairs of running shoes I had used to train for the Vermont City marathon that spring. It took about five runs on Berlin’s cobblestoned streets for the plantar fasciitis to rear its ugly head (foot?) again. For a smart person, I made some pretty idiotic choices. I ran 110 miles that month and kept my 100 mile/month streak alive (excuse me, but whoop-di-fucking-do, that was so worth it – not!). I sought out softer surfaces. I did not buy new shoes or stop running or find some reasonable form of cross-training. Why not? That is a whole other post. Suffice to say, mistakes were made.

Great running. Awful surfaces.

When I got home, I got new shoes and managed to get the PF under control, but it flared up again in September and things crashed badly in October. PF is often multi-factorial and in retrospect, I can read that clearly. The 2009 bout that was so awful points to a potential underlying tendency to severe and tenacious PF. In summer 2016 I was coming off spring training for Vermont City and everyone is more vulnerable to everything post-marathon. The month of running in bad shoes on cobblestones. The perhaps-overly-aggressive mileage increases to prepare for the Philadelphia marathon in the fall. The over-eager attempts to return to running in January and February. Take away any of that and things would maybe not have been as bad, but it’s impossible to know. In any case, I again lost nine months of running to plantar faciitis, but this time, I knew what I was losing.

What is plantar fasciitis? Generally speaking, it’s inflammation of the plantar fascia, which is a ligament that runs along the bottom of your foot, connecting your heel bone to your toes. If it gets irritated, you will feel pain in your heel. Classically, the pain will be worst when you first stand up in the morning. You can develop plantar fasciitis in lots of ways, but most commonly from being on your feet a lot, especially in inadequately supportive shoes. PF is the bane of athletes, but also soldiers and nurses and grocery clerks and cooks. This is a good overview and much shorter than the e-book (also this is free).

http://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/tc/plantar-fasciitis-topic-overview#1

Despite the above claim that PF is inflammation of the plantar fascia, it might not be inflammation at all. Doctors and researchers aren’t exactly sure what is going on with this problem beyond that it’s very common and even famous people get it:

https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/20/no-consensus-on-a-common-cause-of-foot-pain/?_r=0

Since that article was written, Jordan Hasay and Galen Rupp also came down with plantar fasciitis and both have recovered. Rupp won bronze in the marathon at the Rio Olympics and was second at Boston. Hasay was third at Boston. So, plantar fasciitis is something you can beat. Here’s what Jordan has to say about it – the important message here is not the particular doo-dad she is advertising, but that plantar fasciitis eventually goes away. Different remedies work for different people and patience and persistence are your very best weapons. Next time around, front line assault, or what to do right away.

This is my first time doing the Friday Five Link Up so please forgive me if I goof something up! This is linking up with Fairytales and Fitness and also with Running on Happy.

Five weeks of returning to running! After a nearly nine month hiatus and a couple of earlier failed attempts, I am hopeful that this time is going to work.

I am going mess up the Friday Five idea right away by starting with what academics call “Zero items.” That is, items you add to the beginning of a meeting before you get to the actual agenda, or in this case, some pre-running weeks.

Zero item #1) An awful lot of walking in May and June. I was in a boot for five weeks and post-boot, I did a month or so of semi-structured walking.

Zero item #2) A couple of unsanctioned run/walks on the treadmill in late June. I was supposed to wait to run until doing the gait analysis with my new physical therapist, Edie Falcon, but I hadn’t run since March and I had no idea what was going to happen. If my foot was going to blow up on me, I wanted that to happen in the privacy of my own basement where I could sob in peace. If this had been a gait analysis with the Maestro, I would have gone ahead and waited because he has seen me breakdown plenty of times, but I don’t know Edie Falcon well enough to cry in front of her.

Zero item #3) I ran on the treadmill at physical therapy on June 27 for the gait analysis and orthotics measurement. Edie Falcon said I should knock of the unsanctioned run/walks until the orthotics arrive. I grumbled, but complied. I like to pretend I am a rebel, but I am really a good girl. Mostly.

Zero item #4) Orthotics Day! Better than Christmas Day! Friday, July 7^th. But, they arrived at 5pm. On a Friday. It was too late in the day to go have them properly trimmed. I stuffed them in my shoes anyway and went for a walk. With maybe a tiny itsy bitsy jog. NO PAIN. I snuck in an unsanctioned run/walk on July 9^th and again, no pain.

Love these things.

Even academics start to balk at four zero items, so here is actual start to the Friday Five.

Week 1 – July 10:

I got the orthotics trimmed, literally, on the way to the airport. I spent this week in Scotland for work and I did three glorious run/walks around Glasgow. I had a couple of more serious “twinges” as I call them, sudden foot pain that ends pretty quickly. I also managed to provoke a lot of soreness spending an entire day walking around Edinburgh. Totally worth it.

Glasgow is kind of rainy. Who cares??? I got to run!!

Week 2 – July 17:

I returned from Scotland and left for camping at Nickerson State Park 18 hours later. Edie Falcon had left me to my own recognizance in terms of running (brave lady!) which I interpreted as intervals of increasing duration. I ran on the trails every other day, which was perfect. Soft surface and lots of distraction. My foot was still stiff most mornings when I woke up, but by the end of the week, I had a run with no pain at all.

Running on the trails is fabulous

Week 3 – July 24:

Official start with my new coach! I have been texting Coach Mick pretty often (ok, basically daily…) since April but he refused payment until he was the one writing the workouts. I did a pretty extensive search for a new coach last spring and I could not be happier! We did half mile intervals this week, moving to mile long intervals on the weekend, running every third day.

Yeah!

Week 4 – July 31:

This week we increased the interval length to two miles, I did three runs, and I finished one run with strides. The strides had me at near nervous breakdown worry level because I am convinced the tear in my plantar fasciia came from doing strides, but after Coach Mick talked me off the ledge, I gave it a go and they were FINE. Totally FINE! I also got to start running with friends again, something I have missed so very much.

Run with Snarky Girl

Week 5 – August 7:

Dropping the walk breaks! So far I’ve run four miles twice this week, no walk breaks. And I did more strides! I did get a few more of those yucky twinges on Wednesday, but they were much less intense than previous ones. I am telling myself it is not a big deal. Well, to be honest, I made myself fairly crazy on Thursday by spending the day trying to decide if my foot was hurting or not. Is it hurting? Does it feel different than the other foot? Will I have to stop running? Spending a whole day with this particular kind of brain-crazy is exhausting and by the end of Thursday, I was pretty wiped. But today, I got up and ran four miles with Teacher Runner. And I did the strides again. So now I am telling myself this is no big deal. I hope I am listening. I am still taking it one run at a time, but Sunday…assuming everything stays fine, Sunday, I get to run six miles. Fingers crossed. I can not wait!

I am back to running. Which is pretty amazing. I mean, AH-MAZE-ZING! I have been lucky (and smart about training, thanks to Coach Mick – new coach!). So far, I haven’t really had any hiccups with the foot, which (knock all the wood!) seems to continue to feel better every day.

The mind works in mysterious ways though and there are lots of pieces to getting back to running. For me, one of my greatest joys is running with my girlfriends. I have missed these women so much. As often as we try to meet for coffee or drinks or swimming, it’s not the same as the near-daily 6am shared miles that build a friendship and even a sisterhood. I’ve been able to see Snarky Girl and Coach DSS for swimming, but I have missed my running babes so much. More running means more chances to re-integrate into each other’s lives.

We do long runs on Sunday morning so Saturday evening I texted to ask about plans. I got back a time and place and the mileage total, which was, of course, much, much higher than what I was running. I was running three intervals of two miles each with walk breaks. Teacher Runner and Blue Turtle were doing 12-14 miles. If I was expecting balloons and streamers to welcome me back, they weren’t throwing any at me.

My brain decided to get worried about this. I sulked to Mervus. My friends don’t like me anymore. I’m too slow for them now. They are marathon training together and don’t want me barging in. Probably they think I am really boring and too old to hang out with. What if this stupid injury costs me my friends and training partners? I texted back that they were meeting too early for me and I would catch them some other time. I sulked some more. Mervus noted that our group is traditionally very welcoming and if it mattered that much to me, I should just get up earlier and meet them. I texted again, apologizing for being so ridiculous, and said I would meet them after all. Smart Mervus.

I’ve become a real podcast junkie lately and one of my favorites is Tina Muir’s show, Running for Real. One of Tina’s recent guests, Bonnie Kelly, has written a book called “True To Your Core: Uncovering the Subconscious Beliefs That Wreak Havoc on Your Life.” Bonnie points out that most of us have insecurities in our subconscious minds that can really get in our way. Apparently I discovered one of mine Saturday evening with the whole I’m-not-good-enough-they-don’t-want-me fiasco. Bonnie recommends fixing this problem by introducing some possible alternative scenarios. In fact, I discovered that Teacher Runner stopped texting because she fell asleep and Blue Turtle was distracted because she was putting her kids to bed. The lack of streamers had nothing at all to do with me. Good to remember that.

How was the actual running after all that build up? Excellent and uneventful! My brain had spent all its worry-power on the social side of things so it had none left for my foot. I ran two easy miles with Teacher Runner and Blue Turtle and then let them run off while I did my walk break. I was not even tempted to go with them because this return-to-running has been going so very well and I have no desire to screw it up with that kind of shenanigans. Because I spent so much time fretting about whether my friends still liked me (News flash! Of course they do!), I forgot that I haven’t run six miles in months, maybe since November? Total mileage for the day was 6.2 so I finished a nice little 10K in 1:01:28 even with the walk breaks. I suspect I will be bidding them adieu very soon!

By now, many of us have heard the terrible news: Apple is discontinuing the iPod Shuffle. I love my tiny music device and I don’t want to have to deal with music on my phone. I recently sent my Shuffle through the laundry by mistake, but after a rice bath (get it?), it is working fine. I may or may not have ordered a back-up one though, just in case.

I listen to music when I run alone, but that little Shuffle has also seen me through a ridiculous number of hours on the stationary bike and some pretty intense rowing workouts. I don’t care if it’s somehow supposed to be “better” to listen to your own breathing and your footfalls while running. I really love listening to music. So today’s post comes with a request.

When I was injured in spring 2015, I asked my Sub-30 friends to help me put together a recovery playlist. I still have that playlist and I’ve listened to those songs a lot, but a couple of years have gone by and I am ready for something new. Therefore: Music to Come Back To. Here is what I am looking for. A song that represents a new beginning or an enduring truth. Something that brings you hope or joy. I do not want your favorite playlist from Spotify (looking at you, Fearless Leader of Sub-30). I want one song and a story to go with it. I am going to run to these songs (I’m going to run!) and I want to think about you while I am running.

I am a total pop princess, but I am open to all genres. I love what I call “girl-pop” but I run to country, heavy metal, punk, folk, classical and a good dose of musical theater, so your song is perfect, whatever its genre, as long as you’re willing to share its story. Bonus points always for songs that are happy or funny. For a little peek into my head, two of my favorite running songs are “Greased Lightning” and “What Does the Fox Say.” Comebacks are not always easy and laughter is good medicine. I am going to immediately break my own rule of One Song Only by sharing the first three songs that are going on this list. Please share yours!

A Beautiful Day – India.Arie

I discovered this song at the kids’ 2016 dance recital and I knew immediately I had my Vermont City marathon kick-off song. The high school kids danced to this and it was heart-achingly beautiful. So much grace and youth and hope and spirit. Vermont turned out to be really hard but I got through it. Recalling that day by listening to this song has helped me countless times in the last year. Plus, I like the continuity. It feels like this is where I left off. This one is hope and joy and truth all wrapped up together.

Candyman –  Zedd & Aloe Blacc

Aidan’s tap song from the 2017 recital. Again, I knew the first time I heard this song that I wanted to run to it, that it would appear early in the comeback mix. This music is so infectious. Now it also reminds me how many people saw Aidan dancing to this in May 2017 and asked “Who is that young man out there?” He grew up a lot in the past year and this song was part of his soundtrack. Now it will be part of mine.

How Far I’ll Go – Moana Soundtrack – Auli’i Cravalho

Of course this song is for Rose and every other nine year old girl in America. But how could a marathoner resist lyrics like:

If the wind in my sail on the sea stays behind me,
One day I’ll know
How far I’ll go

I confess when I first saw Moana back in December, I was a little disappointed. I had had high expectations. This was going to be like Frozen, but with music by Lin-Manual Miranda. Instead I found it kind of, meh. Now I think I just wasn’t ready for it. I was experiencing some pretty serious doldrums in December and the hope and excitement of this music just whooshed right over my sad, sad head. When I saw Moana for a second time in July, I bought the soundtrack the next day and listened to it seven times in the following 48 hours. That’s not an exaggeration – I counted. I haven’t done that with music since….since Hamilton. Hamilton really is Shakespeare. It’s full of joy, ambition, sadness, revenge, politics, friendship and forgiveness. I spent a lot of hours with Alex in 2016-2017 and I can hardly imagine getting through the year without him. I am not done with Hamilton, but I am not sure he belongs on this playlist. So Moana as a kind of stand-in for Hamilton. A nine year old girl version of Alex with her eyes on the horizon and big dreams in her heart.

Now, what’s your song and your story?

What does that mean actually? Why not call it a comeback, if that’s what it is? Don’t call it a comeback; I’ve been here for years. Is that how the song goes? But that isn’t how my running life has gone. I’ve been away. For a good long while. Completely away since March. More or less away since October. So, this really is a comeback.

In a lot of ways, the whole last year of running feels like a blur or a strange experiment. Or maybe a massive tangent. Maybe it was an education in the school of hard rocks. After all, the plantar fasciitis that stole a year of my running life first cropped up on the cobble-stoned streets of Berlin last July. I ran 100 miles that month, committed to my monthly mileage goal, come hell or high water. Or plantar fasciitis. I ran in the worn-out shoes I had brought with me to Berlin that I somehow did not think to replace. Even though I am fluent in German and there are plenty of running stores in Berlin.

I’ve learned a lot in the past year, in running and in life. I knew I had some changes to make and in some ways, all I could do was leap off a cliff and start making them without really knowing where I was heading. I knew I wanted to run better and live more truly, but I didn’t know how to do those things or even really what that meant. It turns out there’s a lot of truth to the old adage, the more you know, the more you realize what you don’t know.

I certainly never expected these changes to lead me to church. I mean, that’s probably close to the last thing I expected. But with an injured foot for months and months and a son asking if running wasn’t the reason we never managed to go and a daughter mostly willing to come along, and suddenly friends at church instead of acquaintances and a gifted young pastor and just a little reaching out from the congregation – well, suddenly we were going to church. A puzzle piece clicked into place.

I spent the fall trying to run in a better way and that didn’t really click into place. I learned a ton. That increasing mileage probably doesn’t just mean running a couple of extra miles before circuits class. That the overall structure of the week might matter. That some strength exercises are probably better than others for faster running. That there might be an actual point to some sort of real warm-up and potentially also a cool down. That I am not too embarrassed to do drills, though it helps a lot if someone else tells me to do them. That I can train alone. That I have a surprising level of commitment and determination. Actually, I already knew that last one. But I also learned that if the puzzle pieces aren’t fitting together, no amount of commitment and determination is going to allow them to click into place.

So, pardon me if I do call it a comeback. I’m a different runner than I was a year ago. I’m a different person than I was a year ago. Do you hear that? It’s some puzzle pieces clicking. Let’s see what happens next.

Moana soundtrack
Dawn rain in Kelvingrove Park
Incongruous joy

I’ve worked with four different coaches in the past year. I’ve had email or phone contact with at least 15 more and I don’t want to think about how many coaching websites I’ve looked at. When I parted ways with Coach Cowboy last summer, I thought I knew exactly what I was looking for in a coach and that I had some idea how to find that person. Boy, was I wrong. The coach search has taught me a lot, both about myself and about what questions work when interviewing a potential coach and I thought some of that information might be useful to share. Some of the questions are pretty specific to me, but if you are looking for a coach, they might help you think about what things would be specific to you, and that’s what ultimately matters.

In terms of finding a coach, word of mouth works best. There’s a lot of chaff out there. It’s close to free to set up a website to sell your coaching services. RRCA (Road Runners Club of America) is probably the most popular coaching certification course, but you can get certified with one weekend of instruction plus an exam. That’s a great start, but one weekend doesn’t make a person into a great coach. Almost all the coaches who cleared my first hurdle and made it to the phone call stage were people recommended by someone I know. If you are looking for a coach, ask around. Ask at your local running store. Ask in online running groups. In-person coaching can be fabulous, but lots of coaches are virtual and that can work out too. You’re going to save yourself a huge amount of time by starting with a recommendation. I’ve been known to stalk people – that is, figure out from someone’s blog who their coach is and then contact the coach. Hey, whatever works!

Once you’ve got a couple of people in mind, it’s time to figure out what to ask them. Of course you want to know how much they cost and what exactly they offer. It’s also reasonable to ask about certification though in my experience, that is one of the least important factors. The cost and the offerings will be all over the map and most people are certified. Furthermore, you need to find the right coach for you. Athletes definitely want different things and coaches may work better or less well with different athletes.  So how do you sort out who might be a good match? I found that when I asked potential coaches about their approach to training, every single one said he or she treated everyone as an individual. It’s great that there’s so much individuality out there, but that makes that bit of information useless when trying to sort out one coach from another. I eventually did find a new coach though and I’m super happy about that and really excited to start working with him once this foot heals up! So, these are some of the questions that worked for me.

The Basics:

Price: Of course this matters. I talked to one coach twice who I really liked, but he is just too expensive for my budget. But, as DC Rainmaker points out, in this case, it really isn’t true that you get what you pay for. Price is wildly all over the place so keep looking until you find someone you can afford rather than breaking your bank account.

Services: Coaching is a booming market. Particular coaches may have a range of offerings, such as a training plan for a particular race or different price levels based on how much contact they have with athletes. Some coaches will also come work out with you or hold an in-person training sessions where they watch you run. You can join a training group such as the ones offered by the Another Mother Runner folks. British elite runner Tina Muir has brand-new training plans and a great FaceBook group too.  These groups and others like them might have a standard training plan and some kind of support through FaceBook or some other group. Think about what you want and will be comfortable with. I knew I was looking for individualized coaching – that is, a coach who was going to make a training plan for me specifically and give me feedback on how things were going. There are some very tempting groups out there, but for me right now, an individual coach-athlete relationship was the only thing I wanted.

Certification: You might as well ask about this though I don’t think it’s very important. The major coaching certification organizations are RRCA and USATF. Almost everyone hanging out their coaching shingle is certified, but the certification courses are so short that they are just the very beginning of learning how to coach. Still, you might as well ask.

Years experience as a coach: This is an important question so don’t skip it, but be open to different sorts of answers. In general, more experience is probably better because I think you learn a lot over time as a coach. But I received excellent coaching from someone who had coached a lot of football and swimming and very little running, prior to agreeing to work with me. Someone who has grown up around running and coaching might be great or might have a hard time explaining basic concepts to a beginner. On the other hand, a brand-new coach fresh off a weekend RRCA training course might make a lot of mistakes or might be excellent and probably affordable. Getting a feel for a person’s history as a coach matters.

Communication:

Communication frequency: This is an important factor for me and again, the offerings are all over the map. Some coaches regulate communication very carefully: you might be allowed one phone call per week, for example. Some prefer to communicate only through email. Some want you to write up a summary of the week’s training. Again, the important thing here is to think about what you want and to try to get information about whether the coach is willing to do that. Communication turns out to be probably the number one factor for me, assuming that a few other pieces are in place. I want to communicate with my coach almost every day and I want him or her to be okay with that. One way to cut through possible vagueness on this issue is to ask coaches how often they communicate with current athletes. But when my new coach offered that communication was his forte, I knew I was on the right track.

Communication/workout format: A coach has to somehow send you workouts and there are lots of ways to do that. I have received workout schedules by email, by text, through Training Peaks, through Final Surge, and through the VdotO2 program. No one has offered to send workouts via carrier pigeon yet, but you never know. Having used all these different formats, I have a clear preference personally for one of the online workout calendar programs (Training Peaks, Final Surge, etc). An online calendar is going to give you a record of your workouts in a way that is easy to look over – far superior to text or email or pdf. Plus, online workout programs will generally sync with your Garmin or other watches so you don’t have to type in your data manually. That said, for me, this is not a deal breaker. Furthermore, having used three different online workout calendars, I haven’t noticed much difference among them. If you train by heart rate or have other particular data you want, it might be worth investigating what program a particular coach uses. This factor will matter more to someone who is more data-obsessed than I am.

Training approaches, etc.

Training philosophy: This is the million dollar question, the one I thought I understood and therefore the way I would choose a coach when I started looking last summer. Nope. First of all, it turned out to be surprisingly hard to get potential coaches to engage with this question. “What is your training philosophy?” “I treat all my athletes as individuals.” Repeat almost endlessly and therefore meaninglessly.

My breakthrough technique here draws on something I learned from interviewing German politicians, of all things. When people assume you know very little, they start at the beginning. Therefore, demonstrating some knowledge, even potentially incorrect knowledge, can sometimes jump start the conversation. Therefore, I re-framed this question as something like “Of course everyone is an individual, but different coaches draw more heavily from some training philosophies than others. I have friends who swear by Jack Daniels and others who train only by heart rate. Then there’s this Run Less, Run Faster book that some people like. Would you say your approach is closer to one or the other of those?” By the time I started framing the question this way, I already “knew” I wasn’t interested in heart-rate training or Run Less, Run Faster and I was admittedly kind of fishing for Daniels, but I was also open to other ideas. I don’t know what the potential coaches thought of this question, but it sure moved the conversation along faster.

Some coaches brought up approaches I had never heard of or put heart-rate training into a context where I thought I could tolerate it after all. The number of Lydiard devotees this question turned up surprised me and sent me down a fascinating by-way of “what is the difference between Lydiard and Daniels anyway?” fielded by friends in Sub30. Asking the question taught me that I knew way less than I thought I did, but also that I was looking for a coach who was ready to engage with me at this sort of level. One coach’s willingness to jump quickly to technical aspects of running impressed the hell out of me. Another’s hesitancy to dive into these matters caused him to drop off my short list. The insight that I was looking for a coach willing and able to talk about this subject was at least as important as the particular philosophy anyone subscribed to.

Long run thoughts: As someone focused primarily on the marathon distance, the structure of the long run really matters. This means how does the mileage of the long run build over the course of a training cycle, but also what is the internal structure of a particular long run. Here again – I thought I knew a lot more than I did. Having discovered the glories of a long run that is not just Long Slow Distance, but contains some paced intervals, I figured that was the way to go. Honk. Maybe for someone coming off a few successful marathon cycles in a row, but perhaps not so much for a novice marathoner or someone coming off injury. Maybe putting hills into the long run is more important than putting marathon paced miles in there. Maybe the internal structure of the long run varies over the course of the training cycle. Hmmm. Maybe this is one reason I want to hire a coach instead of go it alone.

Strength training: This is a two-part issue. First, can the coach provide strength workouts? Second, what does the coach think about how to integrate strength training and running? For both of these, potential coaches turned out once again to be all over the place. Some coaches are also certified in personal training and are happy to provide running-specific strength workouts. Other coaches don’t feel qualified to do so. Some coaches have really specific ideas about what strength work runners should be doing and when. Others think time spent on the gym is time spent not on the road and prefer that runners devote as much time as possible to running.

As usual, the important thing is to find a match that works for you. I enjoy strength training. I have a personal trainer I adore. I also think strength training is important for runners in general and critically important for female masters runners in particular. One coach I liked a lot doesn’t have his runners in the gym much and ultimately, this one might be a deal breaker for me. I think strength training is probably the most important thing I’ve done to get faster. Plus, Tough Guy Trainer should be earning twice as much money from me, considering our sessions practically double as therapy. In any case, it turns out I don’t need a running coach to provide strength workouts, but I do want a running coach to help figure out how to integrate strength training and running sensibly.

Nutrition: Again, this is a two-part issue. Can the coach provide nutrition help (either in general or during races/long runs) and is there an overall match in philosophy? I’ve never worked with my running coach much on nutrition. I rely on Tough Guy Trainer for overall nutrition help and I haven’t struggled with nutrition for racing. But for some people, this is going to be a critical issue, so if that’s you, be sure to clarify.

Miscellaneous:

What does the coach call his or her “people”?: Coaches might refer to the people who pay them as clients, athletes, runners or possibly something else. I have a small preference for the terms “runner” or “athlete”. I think those are labels that aren’t easy for everyone to claim and using them helps shape your mindset. Again, for me, this is a preference, not a deal breaker.

How many runners does a coach work with and is coaching his or her full time job?: How I wish I had thought of asking this one from the beginning. I have talked to coaches with fewer than five athletes and coaches with more than sixty. The answer to this question will help you get a sense of how much individual attention you can expect. Lots and lots of coaches are balancing their coaching gig with some sort of other job and that also plays into this equation. But more outside work and more athletes mean less time per athlete. There are only so many hours in a day for everyone. If you get a sense that you might end up a cog on someone’s big wheel, listen to your gut.

How many runners “like me” does the coach work with?: As I interviewed more coaches over time, I got a lot better at it. This question ended up working really well. I phrased it like this: “I am a mid-40s adult onset female athlete with a full-time job and two young children, trying to qualify for Boston. Despite my outside commitments, I take my running very seriously.” Then I included a list of my five marathon times. Once I started asking this question, I got answers like: “I currently have six athletes who are very similar to you.” That’s much better information than the more typical “I coach everyone from beginners to Boston qualifiers to people trying to get to the Olympic trials.” I’m sure some coaches are talented enough to coach everyone. But frankly, I don’t want to be a coach’s first attempt at a BQ and I also don’t want to be the only person trying to get to Boston while everyone else is trying to get to the Olympics. Some of my best friends and training partners are former collegiate athletes. I can tell that coaching them is not the same as coaching me, someone who spent pretty much all of college in the library. It really doesn’t matter if a coach is famous or can coach famous people if they have no idea how to help you in particular.

Is the coach a running nerd? [or, substitute your particular interest here]: When I first started talking to coaches last summer, I had no idea this was something I cared about. As my running obsession has grown, though, it turns out I like to follow running news. I’m interested in what elites are doing, in running history, in what science might have to say about various aspects of the sport. This revelation should not have been surprising. I’m pretty much a nerd by profession. I even managed to geek out pretty seriously over wedding planning. But to have a coach with whom I can indulge this particular passion? Well, that’s pretty glorious. Once I understood this about myself, I realized I wanted a running nerd coach who knew more than I did. I probably wouldn’t eliminate someone based on this category, but I considered it a serious plus.

Age and gender: You don’t have to ask about these because they are easy enough to figure out. My feminist soul told me coach gender shouldn’t matter, but my runner’s heart told me it might. I’d like to think these things don’t matter, but I’m not naïve. They probably do. Coach-athlete is a relationship between two humans and humans don’t come in neutral boxes. I have strong opinions and a bossy streak and sometimes a lot of self-confidence. I am going to ask a million questions and expect good answers. I am also trying to take my running to a level it hasn’t been before, something I care passionately about, but am not sure I can do. I’m coming off a pretty rough year of injury. Those things leave me vulnerable and a bit scared sometimes. Everyone’s personality is probably a unique mix of confidence and vulnerability and I think the important thing here is finding a coach who is a good match. I’m not really able to articulate how, but coach age/gender probably goes into this. It’s ok to listen to your intuition here.

Coach speed: Do you care if your coach can run fast or has run fast in the past? This might or might not matter to you. I have actually never asked about this because it seems a rather awkward question. My head believes fully in the idea that you can coach someone to a BQ even if you yourself have never run that fast. My gut tells me I’m going to have more faith in the program of a coach who can run fast or has previously run fast. My head says it doesn’t matter if a coach personally specializes in 5Ks or ultras or some other distance. My heart says, it belongs to the marathon and my coach had better at least understand the appeal.

Social media presence: Is your potential coach on social media? Go ahead and look that person up. If they have a blog that you love, that might be a big plus. If their twitter activity makes you crazy, that’s a potential minus.

This is a lot of questions. Plan on conversations with potential coaches taking 45-60 minutes at least. After all, this is a choice that really matters because you’re going to invest a lot of time and money into training with this person and hopefully they are going to invest in you as well. If you have any thoughts on these questions or want to add your own, please do so in the comments!