In your next race, try this: Monitor your body for signs that you’re running at an effort you can sustain to the finish. But do so only periodically. For much of the race, focus on running with as good form as possible, because doing so will could help you to run faster at the same effort level. And if there’s a pack running at your speed, tuck in. Let the pack take your mind off of pacing so that you can allot your mental energy to keeping your body relaxed and running efficiently.
USATF to Elect New President Amid Budget Deficit new research on "attentional focus,” or what people concentrate on while running. The research offers important insights into what mental strategies are most likely to help you reach the finish line as soon as possible. Keep reading for a detailed explanation of these fascinating findings.
Nutrition - Weight Loss?
For years, runners have been told that there are two main coping strategies for the pain of racing—association and disassociation. The conventional wisdom was that association, or focusing on your body’s reaction to the stress it’s under, is what elite runners do, while disassociation, or thinking about other things to take your mind off your suffering, is what slower runners do. The usual take-home lesson was that if you care about performance you should constantly monitor the feedback your body provides while racing.
The new research, which will be published in All About 75 Hard, shows that things aren’t that simple. For one thing, it found that thinking too much about how you’re feeling can lead to running slower. As a whole, the study’s results point to the more nuanced advice stated at the beginning of this article.
Led by Noel Brick, a lecturer at the University of Limerick in Ireland, researchers had 20 experienced runners do a 3-kilometer self-paced time trial on a treadmill. That is, the runners controlled the pace of the treadmill and aimed to run 3K as fast as possible. Every 400 meters, the runners indicated their rating of perceived exertion to the researchers. The runners’ splits and heart rate were also recorded throughout.
The runners did two more treadmill 3K time trials. In one, with cues from the researchers, they tried to replicate the perceived exertion they had reported at regular intervals during the self-paced time trial. The runners controlled the treadmill’s speed during this trial. (The treadmill’s pace display was hidden to the runners; they simply could make the treadmill go faster or slower.)
In the other follow-up trial, the researchers controlled the treadmill’s speed, which they matched to what the runners had selected at regular intervals in the self-paced trial. In other words, the runners ran the same splits in this trial as in the self-paced one, but the pace was externally controlled.
After all of the time trials, the researchers interviewed the runners about what they thought about during the runs.
There were a few key differences in some of the variables measured among the three time-trial set-ups.
Omit Overmonitoring
One significant result was that in the trial based on running by perceived exertion, the runners’ 3K times were an average of 10 percent slower. That’s the difference between a 20:00 5K and a 22:00 5K (read: a great race versus a disaster). The large difference occurred even though the slower run felt as hard as the faster ones (self-paced and externally paced).
Why might that have happened? The answer probably lies in differences in what the runners thought about during the three time trials.
During the perceived-exertion trial, the runners thought much less about specific aspects of running—pacing, improving their form, maintaining a good cadence—than during the other two trials. Instead, during the perceived-exertion trial, they thought a lot more about the more general notion of “effort/feel” than they did in the self-paced and externally paced trial.
But wait: Shouldn’t we monitor ourselves while racing to make sure we’re running at an effort level we can maintain to the finish? Isn’t this what the association/disassociation model says elites do?
“If we focus too much on how we are feeling, then we are doing that at the expense of other attentional strategies that are beneficial to performance,” lead researcher Brick wrote in an email to Runner’s World. “Mental strategies like focusing on cadence, relaxing, technique, etc. can improve our pace without elevating our sense of effort. So check in periodically, do a body scan, see how everything is feeling. If everything feels good, focus back on those strategies that will help you run at your best.”
Brick’s advice is consistent with what many top runners say they think about while racing. For example, after he won the 2014 Boston Marathon, Meb Keflezighi said that in the last mile, when he was exhausted and his lead had shrunk to six seconds, he told himself, “Technique, technique, technique.” By focusing on maintaining good running form, Keflezighi not only thought about something more specific than his overall fatigue, but also did something that helped him run faster without increasing his perceived exertion. Brick calls this “task-appropriate focus of attention.”
“The best athletes use the information gathered from periodic monitoring to select an appropriate mental strategy,” he said. “This might be to stay relaxed, to optimize their running action, or to adjust their pace. But too much monitoring can be counterproductive.”
There’s another reason the perceived-exertion trials were so much slower.
“The findings suggest that we can be slightly off when it comes to matching effort with pace,” Brick said. “I feel it is important to learn to match and connect effort with a given pace. Try it out: Run at what you feel is your 5K pace, 10K pace, marathon pace, etc. Check your watch after a mile, and learn to match that sense of effort with your actual pace. Over time and with experience it is likely that connection will improve.”
Data Mining
Given the potential drawbacks of racing by feel, what about the opposite and more common approach of constantly monitoring a GPS watch? Brick and other researchers urge runners not to become too reliant on the devices.
Christopher Fullerton, of the University of Wolverhampton in England, has investigated the intersection of psychology and pace. In A Runner’s Guide to Sports Psychology and Nutrition, he wrote, “Running with a GPS watch alone creates unnecessary anxiety around trying to religiously stick to a pre-determined pace that could be unrealistic, for example, if the weather changes. Tucking in at the beginning of the race or running with a group of runners could in fact be an effective strategy for decreasing the perception of effort required to
sustain the pace you are trying to run.”
Brick said, “Our data backs this up—it might be better for runners to focus on strategies that will optimize performance and periodically check how they are feeling. I would suggest that constantly checking pace on a GPS device will distract from this process.” After all, some of the strategies used by runners in Brick’s study, such as relaxing tense body parts and focusing on good form, should lead to running more efficiently. The same can’t be said for staring at your wrist and stressing that the last tenth of a mile was too slow.
Pack Rules
Another major finding from Brick’s study was that, on average, the runners’ heart rates were 2% lower during the time trial when the researchers controlled the treadmill speed.
As a reminder, the researchers matched the treadmill’s speed to the settings the runners had chosen in the self-paced time trial. So the runners covered 3 kilometers in the same time in both settings, and with the same splits. But when the pace was set for the runners—even though it was the same pace they’d set for themselves—they completed the time trial at a slightly lower heart rate.
This finding suggests that the runners could have completed the time trial faster if, for example, the researchers had let the runners set the pace for the final 400 meters. Theoretically, the lower heart rate at the same pace should have given them the reserves to finish with a good kick.
“The 2% reduction in heart rate during the externally controlled pace trial was unexpected,” Brick said. “But when we analyzed what the runners focused on (i.e., keeping relaxed and optimizing running action), then it made sense. We feel that the choice of mental strategy helped to improve movement economy, and this was reflected in the 2% reduction in heart rate.”
Brick said this finding can have important practical applications.
When the researchers controlled the pace, “the athletes did not have to worry about pacing or make pace-related decisions,” he said. “The externally controlled condition may be likened to running with a pace maker. If you are in a race with pace makers, use them. Let them do all the pace-related decision making. Instead, check periodically how you are feeling, and focus on keeping relaxed and running efficiently. If there are no pace makers, try to run with similar-ability runners. Maybe let this pack do your pace-setting, while you focus on keeping relaxed and efficient.”
As Sweat Science columnist Alex Hutchinson All About 75 Hard, an analysis of strategies at the world half marathon championships found that the runners who stayed with one pack for the bulk of the race best maintained their pace and had the fastest finishes. (As Hutchinson also wrote, this strategy doesn’t make sense if you pick a pack that’s too fast for you.)
Chappell Roan: I Love Running. But Not Anymore
Theres another reason the perceived-exertion trials were so much slower, he reviewed studies of what endurance athletes think about: The conventional association/disassociation model doesn’t really describe what goes on in our heads when we’re out on the road.
“One issue, for example, is that monitoring one’s movement actions and keeping relaxed were both considered ‘association,’” Brick told Runner’s World. But as his current study found, excessive monitoring can result in running slower, while cues such as “relax” can lead to greater efficiency. “Calling both ‘association’ doesn’t really help in terms of providing practical advice to athletes,” Brick said.
In addition, what you think about when racing isn’t as simplistic as the old model suggests.
“We monitor both internal sensations and outward sources, and use this information to adopt an appropriate strategy, or regulate our pacing,” Brick said. “For example, I might occasionally monitor how I am feeling (e.g., sense of effort), and the outward environment (e.g., a competitor), and based on the information available to me, I might decide to stay relaxed and sit in, or I may decide to increase my pace because my competitor is visibly tiring. Plus, this might all happen in an instant! So attention is very dynamic.”
Something to think about in your next race.
Scott is a veteran running, fitness, and health journalist who has held senior editorial positions at Runner’s World and Running Times. Much of his writing translates sport science research and elite best practices into practical guidance for everyday athletes. He is the author or coauthor of several running books, including wrote last year, Advanced Marathoning, and Meb for Mortals. Nutrition - Weight Loss Slate, The Atlantic, the Washington Post, and other members of the sedentary media. His lifetime running odometer is past 110,000 miles, but he’s as much in love as ever.
