This Is About Running. This Is Not About Running. summary

Running can be hard. But it isn’t complicated. There are many different types of runs – long or short, continuous or intermittent, uphill or downhill, solo or with a team. But in the end, they’re all about putting one foot in front of the other.

The thing that makes running complicated is you. And your messy life. That’s not an insult. It’s just a reality. Imagine your training schedule for the day calls for an easy 30-minute-run. An easy run – that should be easy, right? Now imagine that on this particular day, you only had five hours of sleep, had to hustle toward a big work deadline, and got in a fight with your spouse. How “easy” does that run sound now?

People run for all kinds of reasons. Some want to move better, some want to hurt less, others want to feel their body, clear their mind, be alone, socialize, or feel healthier, happier, or more at peace. Some run for the sheer joy of it!

In terms of training science, different types of running have different training purposes. Speed runs build speed. Hill runs build leg strength. Fartlek runs – yes, they’re really called that – combine fast and slow runs to build incredible cardiovascular endurance.

After falling in love with running as a young teen, running coach Chris Bennett became the fastest cross-country athlete in New Jersey in 1992 while he was still in high school. He loved running so much that this success felt almost incidental – he just couldn’t stop training. He set himself some running goals and was determined to achieve them.

After his high school success, Chris’s first big running goal was to anchor the winning team in the distance medley at the Penn Relays, a huge New Jersey running event. He wanted to run the final mile leg, his best distance. He visualized the race constantly: keep a strong, steady pace for the first mile or so, be patient, and then overtake the leader in the last 300 meters.

The hardest type of run is an easy run. This is the great paradox of running.

Ask any coach, and they’ll tell you it’s true: most people only know how to run hard. Maybe it’s the grindset culture we live in, constantly reminding us to keep hustling. Or maybe we have an internal sense that if something isn’t effortful, it can’t produce results.

Sometimes you have to walk for a while before you can run.

As a college athlete, Chris Bennett was invited to the prestigious Fifth Avenue Mile in New York. During the race, he developed a bad pain in his foot, stunting his performance. After weeks of misdiagnosis, an X-ray finally showed that he had four bone cracks in his right foot. He spent the next two months in a cast.