The main goal in running is to not get injured

That’s it: don’t get injured!

At now, for me, a 48 year old. But even before.

Perhaps not when I was running in high school, doing cross country and training for other sports. 

Perhaps not when I was in my twenties and running just to stay fit and get outside. Although I did have injuries and niggles even in then.

But in my late 20s and beyond, when I was trying to get better at running and doing races, the goal always should have been just to not get injured. Everything else would have taken care of itself.

I wasted many a year piling training on injuries and niggles until I buried all chance of making it to the start line.

Other sports aren’t like this. Even the contact sports I’ve done. You can get injured. But serious injuries — ones that stop you from training — are near freak events. And most of the minor injuries can be trained around. You can still do your chosen sport.

But the threat of running injuries always looms. And the injuries normally stop you doing your sport.

Not even cycling’s like this. You can overtrain. But it’s difficult to get overuse injuries unless you’ve got serious imbalances. You can fall off your bike. But these are one-offs that are easier to take. Even if it means time away from training. It wasn’t the action of cycling, per se, that caused the injury. So it doesn’t seem as bad.

Despite this, when I’m healthy and running well, I don’t think about avoiding injury. I can’t imagine having an injury or niggle. Even though I’ve had hundreds from running. My mind is on upping my training as much as possible to do as well as I can in the next event I’ve signed up for.

Eventually something snaps, and I get a small injury. A niggle perhaps. But I don’t treat it properly and end up see-sawing between resting and running. I get less fit and robust and even more vulnerable to injury. Other niggles emerge. From there it’s a downhill spiral.

Not in recent years, I should say. I have had injuries and niggles, but I’ve mainly handled them well.

But I need to keep the goal in mind: First, don’t get injured!