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Put a stop to self-sabotage and revolutionise your running. Whether you’re training for a 5K or an ultra, these mental strategies will help re-wire your thinking – and improve your running as a result

Words Katie Campbell Spyrka

Mental strength and resilience are qualities we oft en associate with athletes who spend vast amounts of time in the ‘hurt locker’ – people whose unfathomable feats of endurance seem worlds away from our own running goals.

But while more and more elite athletes are sharing how mastering their mindset became a game-changer in achieving their performance goals, building a toolbox of mental strategies isn’t just for the pros – it could improve your performance and confidence too.“People oft en think that developing a resilient and powerful mindset is something that only applies to professional athletes and Olympians, but that’s just not true,” explains mindset coach Adelaide Goodeve (Adelaidegoodeve. com), who works with athletes of all ages and abilities.

“By working on your mental resilience, you can maintain a positive mindset, stay motivated, knock minutes off your PB and achieve your running goals.”

Reassuringly, mental strategies don’t have to be intimidating, time-consuming or complicated in order to work. Ready to give them a go? Try these expert-approved techniques for size.

1 Be your own cheerleader

How does your internal run dialogue sound? Is it upbeat and positive or does it play gloomy statements such as “I’m slow” or “I can’t run hills” on repeat? If it’s the latter, you’re effectively creating a self-fulfilling prophecy in your brain. “Unfortunately, your brain can’t differentiate between what’s unhelpful and helpful to you – it can only understand which brain pathways you use the most and the least,” explains Adelaide Goodeve. “For example, if you frequently tell yourself ‘I’m a slow runner’, your brain will strengthen the neural pathways associated with being a slow runner, so they become easier to activate and the state of being a slow runner easier for you to enter.”

Frustratingly, your self-styled identity as a ‘slow runner’ is further cemented by the way your brain edits the information it receives.

“When you tell yourself something repeatedly, your brain starts to highlight all the evidence around you that confirms this, such as other, speedier runners or the sessions when you’re feeling sluggish,” says Adelaide. At the same time, your brain filters out evidence to the contrary, so you don’t notice runners who are slower than you or recall the training sessions in which you ran fast. “This reinforces your ‘I’m slow’ belief because your brain isn’t showing you anything to contradict it,” she says.

You can use your brain’s way of working to your advantage

There’s good news, though: you can use your brain’s way of working to your advantage, simply by being your own cheerleader. “Saying positive things like, ‘I’m a fast runner’, ‘I’m getting faster every day’ or ‘I can run one more minute’, will trigger all the feelings, thoughts and actions associated with these words,” explains Adelaide. “And the more you replace the negatives with these powerful, productive and positive words, the more you’ll activate and strengthen these neural pathways – and the harder to activate the old ‘I’m a slow runner’ ones will become.”