Serious: will I regret focusing too much on running later on?

wejo wrote:

tracknoob wrote:

I don't run crazy high mileage or anything, I just train two or three hours a day in the off season. It sounds pretty normal for a high school student, but it might be a bit more of a distraction than you would think.

Likely a troll. 2 or 3 hours a day in the off season? I tried to make the Olympics and I wasn't running that much.

You're in high school, say you don't do much mileage but train 2-3 hours in the offseason?

If you clarify that, maybe I'll answer.

No reason, anyone can't focus on their classes and still train properly.

Training for 2 or 3 hours a day doesn't necessarily mean running that much. My high school practices would start at 3 and there were plenty of nights I didn't get home until 6. We lifted, do core, and hung around for a while after running

wejo wrote:

tracknoob wrote:

I don't run crazy high mileage or anything, I just train two or three hours a day in the off season. It sounds pretty normal for a high school student, but it might be a bit more of a distraction than you would think.

Likely a troll. 2 or 3 hours a day in the off season? I tried to make the Olympics and I wasn't running that much.

You're in high school, say you don't do much mileage but train 2-3 hours in the offseason?

If you clarify that, maybe I'll answer.

No reason, anyone can't focus on their classes and still train properly.

Wejo,

I inflated the time to represent the maximum I might spend in one day, and now that I think about it,I was off by quite a bit. To clarify, that figure would represent the days when I run 5-6 miles easy and then head to the gym to lift. The whole thing usually takes about two hours. Most days, I'll run a tempo or just an easy run, which takes less than an hour. By the time you factor in stretching and warming up, it's usually about an hour and a half minimum before I get home from practice. Right now I'm only at about 30mpw with a lot of quality work, and by the end of the offseason I'm trying to build up to around 50.

I think this is a great conversation to be having. Competitive runners as an aggregate are more obsessive compulsive and all in related to other sports.

Running is generally more kind to those that approach it from a moderation stand point. I'm not saying doing less work, but obsessing less about the little things are a key to along career as long as you aren't at the elite level. I saw my teammates in college that made the largest progression by the end of the career were the ones that could turn it off when they weren't in practice and didn't try to think outside of the box too much.

I've often pondered this exact question. When I wasn't running a few months ago, I would have told you I regret the time I spent on the activity. That comes from an overall bitterness where I gave the sport so much of my focus and didn't have the career I hoped for. In high school I had a good time, maybe too much of one, but I let forthcoming training dictate my modus operandi. Had I put 1/4 of that focus into academics I would have ivy league degrees instead of them being from state schools (my 2.2 GPA in core classes wasn't exactly inviting, but my ACT and SAT scores were top 99th percentile.) Hindsight is 20/20 though, and a teenager sometimes lacks perspective. I have invaluable relationships from my college XC teammates. I met my wife at my university. I have a couple conference championship rings I'm very proud of and more then enough newspaper clippings from a small southern town. Whether I'm 100% satisfied or not, running defined the person I am today.

The mistake the competitive runner makes is forgetting that running doesn't owe him/her anything. It also has a very short memory.