Good at Training, Bad at Racing...

Training Advice/Discussion General

9 years ago 09/18/2014 4:29am EDT

I'm looking for other runners/coaches experiences and advice for those, who like me, are great at training but often to struggle to bring the performance through to racing.

It's not too uncommon for me to run at paces/times at or really close to my PB however, when I race I often struggle to bring the performance through to my race result and will under perform.

It doesn't really matter whether I taper, continue as normal or anything in between, on race day I just seem to struggle to pull out the performance I know that I am capable of.

On race mornings I don't feel nervous, have not obvious signs of pre-race nerves (runners trotts etc.) and would appear to be very relaxed (HR is usually within normal range etc.).

Any advice, comments on how to tackle this would be welcome as it's becoming a little frustrating.

FMcFF

9 years ago 09/18/2014 6:00am EDT

Classic case of 'workout warrior'?

9 years ago 09/18/2014 8:19am EDT

re: SomeBlokeFromTheInternetz

Cheers...I think.. ;O)

Anyone want to contribute anything a little more constructive?

9 years ago 09/18/2014 9:32am EDT

re: YorkieFatBoy

What events do you run?

For some people, being relaxed before a race is bad. They force themselves to almost fall asleep so they don't feel nervous. Instead, they need to embrace the nerves and start bouncing off the walls or get almost angry.

9 years ago 09/18/2014 9:45am EDT

re: YorkieFatBoy

If you really want answers to this you need to give more specific information, i.e, to quantify this a bit. Are you running legitimate, say, 29:00 10kms in training and 31:00s in actual races. What sorts of discrepancies are you getting between your training and racing performances. How often do you race? What's your training like, etc.?

9 years ago 09/18/2014 10:06am EDT

re: YorkieFatBoy

You can really burn up a lot of energy pre-race going over and over and worrying etc..

Each person is different and you sound like me. I can get really keyed up and almost talk myself into a bad race. In HS my best races were almost always in some small meet. I had a VERY competitive coach and his constant pushing didnt help.

Example" My best race came at a meet we thought would be cancelled due to weather, but at the last minute they decided to go on. I had totally put the race out of my mind, so when it suddenly came time to spike up and go I had not had time to over think the darned thing. I just ran.

The only thing you can do is try to relax. Trust your training and do something to distract yourself. I dunno if that's watching a movie on an ipad, playing a game, etc.. you've just got to get out of your own head.

9 years ago 09/18/2014 10:14am EDT

re: YorkieFatBoy

This makes sense to me.When I was part of a track club, I was inspired to always give 110% in practice so that I could get all plus all out of a workout and the fast paces of some of the quicker runners swept me into efforts that were difficult but pleasing to me.Fast forward to races for this: I would come to races so "trained" that I was not fully recovered from training by race day.It was not until I started exclusively training myself with my own paces that my race times actually went down.I think it has to do with overall emotional state. In a training group of 30, you may be the 6th or 7th fastest and feel downright great!But, when 30 people pass you in a race, or 60, or 200, one might tend to lose the original "pumped-up" state they have and the motivation during that race would just not be the same.My advice...is to self-train and use your own pacing as a guide. Also, use feel to guide your training, rather than a clock. Not saying you do these two things, but I did, and not doing that helped me.

YorkieFatBoy wrote:
I'm looking for other runners/coaches experiences and advice for those, who like me, are great at training but often to struggle to bring the performance through to racing.
It's not too uncommon for me to run at paces/times at or really close to my PB however, when I race I often struggle to bring the performance through to my race result and will under perform.
It doesn't really matter whether I taper, continue as normal or anything in between, on race day I just seem to struggle to pull out the performance I know that I am capable of.
On race mornings I don't feel nervous, have not obvious signs of pre-race nerves (runners trotts etc.) and would appear to be very relaxed (HR is usually within normal range etc.).
Any advice, comments on how to tackle this would be welcome as it's becoming a little frustrating.
FMcFF

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