Running philosophy
Run slower to run faster.
Efficiency is the game that you are playing when you want to build a sound running technique. To become more efficient, you should run slow to run more. It's like slowly smoothing a stone. You need to chip off a little every day and start carving better efficiency little by little.
If you want to build endurance and become faster when running long distances, you want to build up aerobic fitness to become more efficient.
- To build up aerobic fitness, practice in the 2nd heart zone (maximum 80% of your maximum heart rate).
- You should feel like you can have a chat.
- You basically should run so that you feel like you can run every day.
Pain is good suffering is bad.
Pain means you are progressing and you are exercising. Pain sends endorphins through your body. Discomfort means you put your body up for a challenge and a test. Enjoy it and embrace it. Think about the good feeling after the pain.
Suffering means you are doing it for the wrong reasons. You do it to lose weight, you run to become faster, and you run to compete against others. Suffering means you are expecting something from running that you are not getting. Suffering means you are expecting something from yourself that you should not.
Enjoy your run
Use your run to listen to audiobooks and podcasts to learn new things and to get inspired.
Use your runs to call friends and family.
Running with friends is the easiest way to create mutual benefit and have a good and deep conversation
Use running as a means to explore your environment.
- When you travel, run to see and explore a city. Its about more than speed but how much you can see. Take a camera with you. Take photos and enjoy the city/ landscape.
- When you are in your hometown, try to explore the outskirts and dirt roads. Go running on trails and try to enjoy the landscape.
Make running even more recreational by also exploring things.
Build a routine
Prepare your runs, have your shoes ready, have your cloth ready, and reduce the amount of mental effort to get going.
Try to run every day! Running every day will have compounding effects. It is not about running every day the max amount of km but rather to max the time you are yielding benefits from running (stress alleviation, better digestion, better sleep, better cardiovascular perf)
Personal take: Run as much barefoot as you can
Research is not conclusive in this discussion, but based on historical data points and studies, I adopted the belief that barefoot running allows the body to run more naturally.
Cushioning and insoles are human interventions in a system developed by multiple million years of evolution.
Running is the fastest sport in the world.
Running needs nothing - If you are at the beach or near a meadow, you do not even need shoes.
Running takes 5-10min to get ready for it no matter where you are, and a maximum of 30m after running to get back into your regular cloth. Running is cheap – it doesn't cost any money.