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Six Steps to Better Racing

by Harry Cross

Has this ever happened to you?  At the race starting line, you feel fit as a fiddle.  The gun goes off, and the adrenaline flows.  You and your excited compatriots whisk through the first mile way ahead of pace.  PR’s tantalize your imagination.  A couple of miles later, your legs are gone and you can’t get enough air.  People you normally beat are passing you in droves.  Your unhappy fate is to limp to the finish line, and hope that your friends and family don’t see you. 

Well, if this experience sounds familiar to you, don’t feel bad, because you have a lot of company.  Almost every racer, from the fastest to the slowest, has made this painful mistake at one time or another.  You can avoid this and other common pitfalls by remembering a few simple rules and principles about racing. 

1.  Have a realistic race plan.  Racing at your potential requires an objective approach.  A little bit of organization helps, too.  No matter what the distance, be modest and pick a desired finishing time that’s within the realm of possibility.  A 10K PR is rarely broken by more than 30 to 60 seconds, so don’t get yourself into an impossible bind by having a goal you can’t achieve. 

If you’re fit and uninjured, and you completed your last 10K in 48:00, aim for 47:30 or 47:00 in your next race.  By being patient, you’ll increase your satisfaction with racing.  If you break 48:00, you’ll feel good; if you run 47:00, you’ll feel great.  If you run 48:30-well, you’ve only missed your goal by a little bit, and there’s always next week. 

2.  Don’t go out too fast.  The starting line environment can easily seduce you into going out too fast in the first mile.  There’s the adrenaline, the mob psychology, and the desire to do well.  Add to this a few police cars, a loudspeaker, a starting gun, and several hundred sprinting runners, and you have all the necessary stimuli to make you tear through the first mile. 

Instead, at the starting line, take some deep breaths, and convince yourself that you’re not going to allow yourself to be stampeded into a bad race.   When the gun goes off and you begin to run, consciously hold yourself back a bit.  Concentrate on being relaxed, running smoothly, and keeping your neck and shoulders relaxed.   If you do this, the first mile will take care of itself and you will still probably arrive at the marker under your desired race pace.   In any case, your first mile should not be more than 10 to 20 seconds faster than your hoped-for average race pace. 

Running too fast over the first mile causes more bad races than any other single factor and is guaranteed to tire you when you should be conserving comfortably.  It can make you feel like you are “tying up” much sooner, and it can be psychologically damaging.   It is difficult enough to keep it together over the second half of a 10K.  The last thing you need is the sinking feeling of slowing down. 

If you haven’t gone out too fast, you should feel good at the mile point, in control of the race, and ready to concentrate on the remaining miles.   Your job now is to maintain the pace. 

3.  Keep an even pace.  The benefits of running evenly paced races are well documented.  The best races are run within a narrow range of per mile times.  World class runners usually stay within 5 or 10 seconds of their average per mile pace for each individual mile in a 10K.  The implications for weekend racers is clear: an even paced race will get the best performance out of your body. 

Over the course of a race, it takes increasing physical and mental effort to maintain an even pace.  You can meet this challenge by keeping relaxed and in control, and by increasing your concentration as the miles go by.  Keep thinking about what you’re doing.  Keep mentally checking your running form, your breathing, and your leg speed.  This type of feedback will keep you mentally “in” the race, and will enable you to notice problems and correct them before it’s too late. 

One of the most difficult parts of racing a 10K comes between miles 3 and 5, where the exuberance of the start is gone and the finish seems so far away.  Mental tricks can help here.  Think of the race as segments, and concentrate on one part at a time.  When you’re at the 3 mile mark, think only about running to the 4 mile mark.   When you reach the 4 mile point, take a few deep breaths, be happy that you made it that far, and focus on making it to the 5 mile mark.  This approach is easier than thinking about the whole distance before you. 

The last mile, like the first, should take care of itself.   By this point, you’ve got too much invested in the race to let up on your concentration and physical effort.  The key here is to “keep it all together” to the finish.  The best way to do this is by staying relaxed while trying to ever-so-slightly increase your leg speed.   Doing this should help you maintain your pace and maybe even pick it up a bit. Start rewarding yourself by thinking about how good you’ll feel 5 minutes after the finish. 

4.  Warm up and warm down.  Don’t ever run a race of less than 20 miles without warming up.  Warm-up routines are easy and will make your first mile more comfortable.  At a minimum, you should jog for ½ to 1 mile, do stretching exercises, then run 4 or 5 times 100 meters at faster than race pace, jogging 20 or 30 seconds between each 100 meters.  Walk or trot to the starting line, stretching along the way.  Don’t arrive at the start more than 5 minutes before the race begins.  Too much standing around can reduce the benefits of warming up. 

Warm-downs are simple.  Find a few friends, jog a mile, and relieve the race.  The warm-down will keep your muscles from tightening and will give you mental satisfaction.

5.  Don’t race injured.  Almost as common as going out too fast is running a race while injured or on the verge of injury.  We all have the “it can’t be happening to me,” and “it will all go away” mentality.  When injured or on the verge of injury, caution should be your motto.  The saying “a stitch in time saves nine” really applies here.  It is frustrating to train for a race, and then end up taking the day off rather than whizzing through a PR.  But if you want to run and race consistently all year, you’ve got to lay off once in a while when your body says so. 

6.  Don’t worry.  Running is just like the rest of your life.  You will have good days and bad days.  Rejoice in your good days, and don’t worry about the bad ones.  You can be sure that you’re going to have some days when your body doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to.  If one of those days happens to be a race day, the result can be disastrous.  Bad days happen to everyone eventually.  So take the situation in stride, be glad you can still run, and think about how well you’re going to come back the next week!