Running Lessons

6 Km

And we made it to the 6th kilometer. I want to talk to you now about an important part of the activity you are starting. It doesn’t matter what it is, should it be a blog, a new business, a book or your first 5 kilometers running.

An important part of any journey is to enjoy it. Have fun.

That’s is why today’s picture are our 2 sons, “dancing like no one is watching”. Simply enjoying themselves.

We have talked about the reasons you took to start your journey and some tricks to keep going. Now, you have to love what you are doing in order to make it an habit. As a saying goes, “if you love what you do, you’ll never work another day”. And the concept is not related to not working thus to enjoying so much what you do that it doesn’t feel as work. It’s something you have fun doing.

When running I always have on my soundtrack a song that simply brings a smile on my face. It can a be a funny song or a deep song, it has to be what you like and make sure it reminds you of yourself. Of what you enjoy.

I can assure you the moment that song comes up you are going to smile and not only that, you are going to feel new energy going through your legs and a sparkle all through your body. It’s like an energy shot, right when you need it.

For example I have my happy songs, strategically positioned on my playlist for a time around my 5Ks, 10Kms and 15kms, because these are the moments I need that push. I run a half marathon as if it would be 4 5Kms runs, so I need to close strong every 5 kms and feel motivated to continue.

Your playlist should make you happy and in sync with your running, nice flow at the start to start easy, don’t over doit, a couple of Kickstarters to get your energy going and in crescendo beats so you start picking up as you go.

So I will give you a task, in preparation for your next race do a playlist planning that goes in line with your race planning. Make sure you start smooth and easy with songs that give you peace and warm you up, then have a happy kickstarter that brings energy and upped it a notch. Your following block should make you pump a little bit and pick up the pace and only for the last kilometer give yourself a high amp music.

That rock you love or love song or whatever style that pumps you high. Leave those for the last 5 minutes and then give it a go.

Use your playlist as your ultimate coach during the race. Don’t overwork it too soon, follow the beat of your music and you should be improving on your pacing and stamina right away.

I hope this works for you and expect you to have an smile while you do it. And like my boys, run like no one is watching. Enjoy it, have fun, don’t focus only on the time. It has to be something you love. Fall in love with it. Good luck and we are seeing each other in the 7th…

5 Km

Hello again. We made it to the 5th kilometer, and this is only because you had a goal. You wanted to go for those 5 kilometers or for that project or that thing that moves you.

Goals are that essential element that when clearly stated and followed can help you when you are not clear on what you are looking to achieve. For now let’s say you decided to give running a try, the 1st step as we mentioned before is clearing the excuses and putting in place a partner or someone to hold you accountable.

That got you running, you are starting. Now the important part at this moment to keep momentum coming is to have a goal. What you want to achieve.

And the goal could be as simple as I’m going to run continuously for 30 minutes, or I’m going to finish my 1st 5K without walking. The important is not which is your goal, the important part of this journey is to have a goal.

A goal serves as motivation, it guides you, when things are not going the way you want it, reminds you of what you want to achieve so you don’t derail.

In our early years running, Linnette and I shared some great goals. We started from the most basic of all, we are going to run 5km without walking. Is going to be continuous jog, it doesn’t matter the time, at first the important thing was to achieve a full jogged race. Then we move on to times, we where already running steady for 35-40 minutes to so we went for 5k in 30 minutes. Today we are talking about our first marathon by our 45th birthday year.

When you are working is the same. You need to have goals and clearly they need to be SMART. My friends from FMCG are going to laugh now, this are like the most used acronym in goals definition, yet so important.

SMART goals, stand for

S – specific. You need to be very clear on definition. You want to run a 5K or you want to run a 10K in 3 months or you want to go for a half marathon in a year. When defining do it so in a way that is challenging yet Achievable (more on that on A).
M- measurable. It needs to be something you can track. For instance if you are going for 10K you need to run 5K first, so you will define milestones to track your progress and be ready by the time you are on your set target.
A – achievable. This is very important, if you define a target that is low probability or unreasonable, chances are you are going to feel disappointed in the process and not reach your goals. As I said they need to be challenging yet achievable.
R – relevant. This is vey company driven as the idea is that your goals should be aligned and relevant to companies goals. But you can make it relevant. Why are you running, for good health, for fun. It has to connect with what you enjoy, with your why. Why go 3 or 4 times a week to spend and hour or so in the sun or in the treadmill. If its not relevant for you, it’s probable you are going to leave it a some point.
T – time related. This is related to the specifics and the measuring. It has to be time defined. You can’t say I’m going to run a 5K someday. Put a date on it, or better subscribe to a race 3, 5 months in advance. This way you have already your goal, with a specific window of time and a clear picture of the final picture.

Now things to remember in order to achieve your goals, you need a plan. A goal is not a plan, is the consequence of a series of actions that you define and follow through to reach your goal. If well defined it’s very easy to write your plan, if not is going to cost.

So wish you the best on defining your goals. I have mine clear for this month, for this semester and for the year being. And I will be here to share with you whenever you want to discuss yours and team up on building your plan.

Best of lucks, keep running and meet you in the 6th kilometer.

4 Km

As we saw in the 3rd kilometer, when you start stretching yourself you develop.

And in the process we got to the 4 kilometer, and we are gonna talk about the importante of celebrating these small victories.

When you are starting something is important to keep your self motivation up, as there would come difficulties and excuses. In this moments a great way to keep motivation at the highest is to celebrate the small victories, those small changes that when added up make up to big goals.

In our case, the whole running thing started as an opportunity to share an activity together, and resulted in a complete change in lifestyle. Yet we celebrated every small step forward we made.

How from accidentally running a 3 Km in almost an hour, in less than a year we where running a 5K every month and consistently improving in our times. And it may seem far, but now looking backwards every small triumph we celebrated.

The improvements in time, the improvements in running the whole run. When we started we could walk at times and suddenly the conversation was, I completed the whole run without stopping and that was really a moment to celebrate.

In the office that’s something that gets overlooked time and time. And with the whole pressure in results and uncertainty is very easy to forget that is not only the finish line what matters, but also how you get there. I learned that the hard way, as this was something I wasn’t used to; the importance of celebrating with my teams.

The impact you can have on your team and the morale when you recognize and celebrate the small wins, is amazing. This builds on team spirit and is the way into a virtuous cycle, where one good action generates a reaction (celebration) and pulls the team towards bigger actions and results.

An in a more personal learning, in order to celebrate small achievements or wins you have to be very aware of everything. This means being very aware of all team members and their actions, and connecting. This only adds to creating a stronger team environment where all team actions are recognized, small wins are celebrated and the team heads up all in the right direction.

So my advice to you is, tomorrow when you start running and you get to your finish line, celebrate and celebrate in big because you are winning, winning from all those that didn’t start, or those that didn’t show up. You showed up, you started and you finished.

And celebrate your team victories, as this will add up to winning wars and achieving your goals.

I hope this serves you, and you start celebrating those small victories. And by the time you get to the 5th kilometer we’ll be talking again. Congrats its time to celebrate.

3 Km

The 3km get us to the story of how we started running. And talks about fear of the unknown and how you can always with the right preparation should try new things and challenges. Challenge the status quo.

In our case our status quo was running at home very comfortable with air conditioning in a treadmill. So this time, I told Linnette that we should try something new and go for an actual race. Even though we did not considered ourselves runners we wanted to try something new and experiment with an actual race.

So we looked for the shortest race we could find. A local race was offering a 3km route, which is not that usual and a regular 5K. We went to our 1st race and as newbies in the business started our 3km course. Not being aware and knowing the instructions (study the route, know where you are running, etc), we missed the 3km return and ended up doing a 5K in almost 50 minutes. A little more than 9 minutes per km, for us was a great accomplishment at the time and proof we were actually runners.

And the strong lesson we learned was that growth is going to happen when you dare to change your status quo. Actually we haven’t ran before for more than 30 minutes and maybe occasionally 35 -36 minutes, yet our body was well trained and prepared for more.

Many times at work we don’t go for the new role or promotion because we think we are not ready yet. Truth is we have been preparing for maybe 2, 3 years or maybe a little more and precisely is this time doing and preparing that enables us to tackle into new ventures. Not having done it before doesn’t mean you are not capable it only means “you have not do it before”.

Think of a baby and how many times he starts doing something from scratch, crawling, standing up, walking and then running. Do you think he shouldn’t do it because he hasn’t done it before.

Precisely my lesson and recommendation to you is,

Always try new things. You may surprise you to learn new abilities or develop ones you had on stand by.
Don’t settle for status quo. It’s amazing how many different ways to see a problem are, look for new perspectives, try new conversations.
Hear your fears, but don’t let them stop you from trying.

Linnette and I already ran 3 half marathons and we started as the couple that was going to run 3Kms after 40. So don’t hold yourself.

I hope you already started walking, running or writing as I’m doing. Let me know how its going. What do you like, about what you write, and keep pushing yourself, try new things and lets meet by the 4km.

2Km

And, we are back for the 2nd kilometer. And it starts with a common phrase that we see many times yet is easily visualized when you put names on it.

¨If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. ¨- African Proverb

Sometimes we take for granted the importance of our support network. During that 1st year that I started walking, Linnette would just ask me, are you going to walk? And that would be enough to start up the engine of not letting someone down.

And after 4 months doing regular walking, some boredom kicked in. My coaches’ question (and its funny but today, 4 years later had I identified that Linnette was my coach all the way, even though none of us knew it) was Why don’t you run? Which led to me to start running in the treadmill. And the 30 minutes a day that I spent every morning went from being 1-2 kilometers at walking pace to know having on a regular basis something between 3-4 kilometers.

Well, that is the importance of this support network. They are the ones that push you to become a better version of yourself and also held you accountable on your commitments.

The 1st 60 days of any project you are starting are the most important. Is when fear, excuses, boredom, or any other roadblock can derail you from your project.

In work it functions as well. Make sure that your team doesn’t fall into complacency and ask them to held you accountable and keep pushing you to be your best self. The more you are surrounded with people that expects the best from you and won’t allow you to quit, the easiest is to keep yourself on track to get farther.

So now that we are closing our 2nd kilometer, make sure that you have your support network in place. If you are going for a new routine, get a teammate, or a partner. Or look for a mutual interest to share and put all your energy in building something that benefits you both.

There will be days when that person, friend or colleague will call you out and keep you on track. And there will be days when the one doing the calling will be you, but the important thing is that you are not alone and together you´ll get farther.

Now, let me know what your plans are. What do you want to start? You already put on the sneakers and went for that 1^st kilometer. Let’s help each other and build this together km by km.

See ya in the 3rd kilometer.

What this all about?

“If you’re afraid to fail, then you’re probably going to fail”
— Kobe Bryant.

Please be aware, I´m not a personal trainer and don’t pretend to be. I´m a regular Joe that started running 4 years ago, after 40 by the way and wanted to share with you my journey and the lessons that running has brought into my life.

The Mamba quote is a great start, because this is the 1st time I´m writing and its similar to when I started running. It takes just one step and then one another to start something. Yet if you don’t take that first step you are not going nowhere.

So we’ll take this journey kilometer by kilometer. And I hope, by the 10Km you’ll have something new, a new hobby, a new routine or maybe you’ll be joining me on the 10Km in your first long run.

Hope to hear from you and all comments are welcomed.

1Km

Running is a funny business, because it can be a team sport, an individual sport or simply a personal challenge.

Yet what’s my lesson for the 1st kilometer?

My biggest learning for the 1st kilometer is that anyone and I mean anyone can do it. 1,000 meters or 3,280 feet depending on what you are used to, is about taking between 1,200 to 1,500 steps.

And how my 1st kilometer happened, it’s a really funny history.

I had always been very inconsistent with exercise, usually would go to the gym at the start of the year and by February I wouldn’t had the time, or traveling happened and missed the momentum or I would found the perfect excuse for not having the time, then the continuity.

What changed is that starting 2015 my wife, which I would always be grateful to asked me: “Why don’t you use the treadmill that you give to me in 2014 and do some walking in the room, if its so hard to find the time to exercise.”

So I started walking, yes walking in a treadmill in our bedroom. And probably for the 1st year, I would only walk.

And how did I manage to stick to a routine, by eliminating the excuses.

It’s raining. It’s cold. It didn’t matter I was walking indoor 1.5 meters from my bed.
I’m tired. I don’t have time. The sneakers slept by the side of the bed and I started waking up 30 minutes before my usual time. Those 30 minutes allowed me to walk something between 1Km and 1.5Kms. Just for sake of comparison my best Km running today is 4 minutes and a half.
It’s boring. We installed an Ipad on the treadmill and Netflix became my best friend. Actually during my 1st year walking I was able to see the first 6 seasons of Supernatural, complete.

Then we have our first lesson, to start anything you have to eliminate the excuses. And eliminating excuses can be something as simple as putting a pair of sneakers by the bed side, to as complex as I’m assuring that my sales team has the best locations in store so they can not use execution as an excuse for performance.

Now it’s your turn to share with me. What you want to start. It’s a new business, a new routine, a blog. What´s moving you, and lets build it together km by km.

Hope to see you in the 2nd kilometer.