Running has taught me many things, from deeply personal to useful knowledge.
I’m linking up with My First 5K and More, Running With Attitude, Runs with Pugs, Zenaida and Run Laugh Eat Pie for Fit Five Friday. Today I’m sharing 5 things I learned through running — not necessarily five things I learned about running.
1: How many meters are in a mile
As well as how many in a quarter and half mile. Because these are are metrics runners use in their workouts — but I wasn’t raised on the metric system.
2: What Negative Splits are
Think negative splits are only for running? Let’s circle back to that New Year’s goals analogy. Start out with just a few goals, and you are much more likely to make lasting change than if you start out like a bat out of . . . you know.
3: What pronate, supinate, and heel strike means
As well as whether or not I do any of the above (yes, I supinate).
4: How to pace myself
Pacing is important in almost everything we do in life. Push too hard, laugh at recovery, and you’re likely to burn out at some point. Same thing with starting out too quickly (can we say a million New Year’s goals?). Letting analysis paralysis keep you from even trying is even worse!
5: I don’t melt
I wish I had $1 (inflation!) for every time Mr. Judy is reluctant to walk because it might rain. Sometimes he’s right, sometimes it’s a light drizzle that quickly stops, and sometimes the rain that’s on the radar never makes an appearance at all. I’ve learned through many rainy runs and races that I don’t melt. I’ve also learned that weather apps lie. Frequently.
Final Thoughts
It will come as no shock to my blog readers who’ve been around a while that I like to learn new things. I like to understand why things happen. Running has taught me many things, and many of those things apply to other areas of my life. Like the time we were trying to figure out how far 1500 feet was — between the two of us, without looking at Google, we figured it out.
Was there anything you learned when you started to run?
Anything you learned through running that really surprised you?
Has running given you personal insights into yourself?
Chocolaterunsjudy 
Oh goodness, I’ve learnt so many new things. Where do I start…well from being connected to you all on the blog, I had to learn how to convert miles into km. We use km here so when you’d talk of running 2 miles or 4 miles, I had no clue what was going on! But I quickly learnt how to do a basic conversion, LOL! Negative splits, meaning of an out-and-back run, acronyms like DOMS, that most runs should actually be run Easy (when I started I thought each run is meant to be faster than the last!) I could go on and on!
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Yes, I once was running on a treadmill in Europe which obviously was in KM. I hadn’t thought about that before I left so finding the right pace was a struggle!
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Definitely learned a lot.
The things you mentioned.
The importance of friends in running. It takes a tribe as they say. At least for me.
I’ve played tennis competitively for years. But in running finishing is winning. Winning matters more in other sports.
Of course the most important is you are capable of more than you think. When I started, 5ks were what I thought I could do in my 60s. A marathon? Who would have thought?
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I never thought I’d race at all.
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All of the above 😉 It took me forever to figure out what PR meant (I know, #facepalm, LOL). There are so many “running” words that established runners (myself included) throw out and take for granted. I often forget the learning curve that some newbies haven’t yet experienced.
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I remember wondering why there’s 2 starting mats for the longest time until I looked it up!
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running does teach us so much! The pacing part I still need to work on. Running has also taught me I am capable of far more than I would give myself credit for,
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Pacing isn’t easy but it certainly likes to keep teaching us lessons. 🙂
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Oh yes- so many lessons learned from running can be applied to other areas of life. One big one for me is breaking down huge tasks into little pieces, and trying to be present where I am while taking one step at a time- just like a long run.
You’re good with the metric system! After all these years, I still can only convert a distance if it’s 5k, 10k or a multiple of those. If someone tells me their pace in kms (like they ran at xxx km per mile) my mind instantly shuts down and I give up. Ha ha… I don’t like math.
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Oh I have zero understanding of pace in KM!
I learned about breaking everything into small steps when I got really into dog training. Long before Bandit but has certainly helped with training an older dog! It’s funny the things he picks up really quickly & the other things he’s just terrible at!
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So many lessons from running! I think I was most surprised by how much running is mental, and that I’m so much stronger (mentally) than I gave myself credit for.
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That is such an important lesson! Because most things in life are really in our heads!
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Gosh I’ve learned so much from running! Though I’ve yet to fully learn the conversion of kilometers back to miles (and I wasn’t raised on the metric system either but here I am haha).
What running has taught me the most though is that I can literally do anything. I never imagined when I started running that I would run more than 5K, then I ran 7K, then 10K, then 15K and so on. Each time I hit a new milestone I learned that if I put my mind to it, I could do it. If it was hard, I could still do it. If I had obstacles, I could still do it. And I use those lessons in everything now. If I feel frustrated or upset about something else in my life, I know that I WILL get through it because I absolutely can.
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Well, I definitely have some frustration in my life! Trying to work through it. 🙂
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So many things! What you wear matters because chaffing can be excruciating so it’s well worth it to quickly figure this one out. For me, figuring out hydration and fueling before, during, and after running. These were also big learning processes for me.
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Obviously I’m still figuring out hydration!
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