Changing habits to run better
When people talk and write about habit change, we tend to think about dieting and New Year’s resolutions a lot of the time, but habit change goes way beyond the scope of an arbitrary date or what we eat. Let’s look at what you can change to improve your running, and how to do it.
One quick point before we start, the “it takes 21 days to form a habit” saying is not remotely true. Habits and people are far too complex to boil it down to such a number. It could take much longer, so don’t give up if you’re struggling to make it work beyond the 3-week point.
What makes us better runners
If we take “better” runner as meaning that we’re closer to our physical potential, then for most runners, what we can do to improve would include strengthening, stretching or mobility exercise, running more miles, increasing exercise intensity or frequency, performing running technique drills or nutrition that supports recovery.
We’ll focus on adding new habits for now since that’s where most of us can improve more easily, but with any change to our habits, we need to know where to start. That means analysing what you currently do at the very least, and potentially giving it a rating out of 10, with 10 being the maximum we’d happily do without negative consequences.
A score of 10 for weekly mileage may equate to 50 miles, but if I’m currently running 40 miles per week and am unwilling to run more, I’ll give myself a score of 8 right now.
Decide what to change
Once you’ve gone through a list of everything you could change, with or without ratings of where you are right now, decide on 1-3 things you’ll start changing. Once you know what to change, commit to doing it in set parameters such a daily or 3 times per week. Next, work out how you’ll go about making that happen and when, just don’t wait until Monday (unless you’re reading this on a Sunday).
An easy way to make sure you don’t forget to add a new habit, is to attach it to a daily task like cooking or cleaning your teeth.
Start making changes
Keep a diary of your actions, or use a calendar, adding a tally or tick to every day that you successfully perform the desired action. The dopamine hit your brain gives you for ticking something off, is really powerful for keeping you on track to start with whilst the habit is forming. You can download free apps for developing habits. You can decide what habit you work on, and it will give you daily reminders plus the ability to tick things off.
Three easy changes you could make
1) Foam roll or mobilise one muscle group per day for 2 minutes per side. Do it right before you clean your teeth, or if you’re short of time, whilst your dinner’s cooking.
2) Perform running technique drills 4 days per week. Do the drills at the start or end of every run you do.
3) Spend 90 minutes each week on strengthening exercises. Split this into 15 minutes, 6 days per week or three 30-minute sessions. Whichever works in your diary and with your motivation better is the right choice.
Once you’ve made your list of changes, worked out what to change, how you’ll do it and when to start, you’re half-way there. Keep your original list and scoring (if you do that step) to look back on and see how far you’ve come, plus what to add in next.
Written by Kyle Brooks, Running Coach based in Norwich, Norfolk
