Ah, a hockey reference. If you didn’t know, my family are big hockey fans (NY Rangers fans, to be exact) and just like with any sport, there are so many analogies that can be drawn from hockey and related to life. Something that really resonates with me right now is the idea of playing whistle to whistle. What does that even mean?
Basically, it describes a method of coaching where the players are urged to let go of the bigger picture and play the best they can while they’re on the ice, until they hear a whistle blow to stop play. They’re not playing to win a whole period. They’re not playing to win the whole game. They’re playing the best they can for the amount of time they can control.
That’s the ideal way of going after a goal in real life as well, isn’t it? Especially a big goal, which can seem insurmountable if you focus on all that would need to be done to accomplish it. Forget the big goal. Focus on playing whistle to whistle. Accomplish what you can this week, this day, this hour, even.
You know how close I got to my A goal – actually, my big running goal for the year – at the Brooklyn Half ten days ago. I was less than two minutes off making the time I wanted to achieve this year for a half marathon – 1:45. I knew I had my next half marathon coming up two weeks later and I felt confident I could recover and try again if I needed to.
Then, you know what happened? I got a cold and it prevented me from getting any quality running done. In fact, I ended up taking more time off running than I think I’ve taken in over a year.
My first instinct was, “I may as well just run the next half for fun – there’s no possibility of making it anywhere close to my current PR anymore.” But then I started thinking about the idea of just concentrating on that small period of time I can control – from whistle to whistle. I ran yesterday (with Roman in the stroller, probably subconsciously so that if it sucked, I could blame it on pushing 30 pounds while I ran!) and it felt pretty good. In fact, I realized that all my fears of losing my fitness in such a short period of time were unfounded.
I’m going for it again on Sunday. I may well crash and burn. But I’m going to plan my pace, visualize what I want to happen and go for it.
I’m going to run it mile to mile.
I love this! Sometimes I get a “PR or nothing” mindset and then get discouraged if everything doesn’t go exactly as according to plan, so it helps to think ‘I’ll just do the best I can TODAY’.
Plus- you might totally surprise yourself!! 2 weeks isn’t enough time to lose a lot of fitness, and maybe you will run even better well-rested!
Karen recently posted…Bayshore Marathon 2014
Thanks, Karen! I hope you’re right – I haven’t had any issues with the couple of runs I’ve done this week, so we’ll see how it works out on Sunday!
I love your approach and think that you can totally do this. You still have the training and maybe running on fresher legs will be the difference for those 2 minutes!!!
Kim recently posted…Sometimes Sore Is Good…
You never know, right? Even if I don’t run well, it’s the kick off of a week’s vacation, so if I have to drown my sorrows with a glass of wine by the pool or beach, I’ll be okay about that!! 😉