Not every day can be a good day.

As a runner, it can be difficult to accept that not every day can be a good day. We may want it to be and we may have the intention for it to be, but it’s just part of the running package, it can’t all be straight forward and plain sailing. Plus, would we really want it to be easy?
 
We are only human, therefore it is unavoidable that with tough training and pushing ourselves to the limit, our bodies will get tired and our legs will feel heavy. Yes, some sessions won’t be as good as others, but that’s ok. If every session was amazing, no session would ever seem particularly good because we wouldn’t have anything to compare to. We need the tough, heavy-legged sessions for the good ones to be noticed. It’s the tougher training days when it feels harder than usual that mean the most. It is these days that motivate us to keep working hard. We long for the days it all just slots into place. These only happen a few times a year, but when they come, it is worth all the hard work. There is nothing else that compares to the feeling of a session or race that goes exactly as, if not better than, you want it to. However, these just don’t happen without extremely tough, difficult days. ​

Whilst on some days it is our legs that don’t cooperate, other days it’s our heads that make training hard. At times, we feel tired and heavy headed, and this is normal and ok to happen! Some sessions pose more of a mental than physical challenge, therefore we have to train our minds as well as our bodies. Running is as much mental as it is physical. We wouldn’t let our bodies get the better of us, so we have to work not let our heads beat us. It isn’t spoken about often enough, but quite often the tough sessions are due to our minds being tired rather than our legs. If we have struggled to sleep, have other stresses in our lives, such as work, exams, or family, or are just feeling down, sessions and races can feel a lot tougher than usual. As athletes we have to understand this is all part of the journey and the roller-coaster of sport and life.

It can sometimes be difficult to believe, but everyone has bad days at the office. Social media may make it look as though people have their lives together and every day is full of motivation and success, but this isn’t the case. Social media has an amazing ability to sugar coat people’s lives. Life is much more complex and challenging than social media shows it to be. You may think you are the only person who goes into some sessions feeling heavy legged from the buildup of the previous weeks training, but you aren’t. It happens to others, it happens to me, and it happens to you! It even happens to professional athletes!

We have to accept it, not every day can be a good day. ​