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RunFest #1 Vera Alves - A lazy person's guide to long distance running
- 1. Hello, I’m Vera. supergenericgirl.com // @supergenericgal
- 11. “Perhaps the genius of ultra running is its supreme lack of utility. It makes no sense in a world of spaceships and supercomputers to run vast distances on foot. […] But as poets, apostles and philosophers have insisted from the dawn of time, there is more to life than logic and common sense. The ultra runners know this instinctively. And they know something else that is lost on the sedentary. They understand, perhaps better than anyone, that the doors to the spirit will swing open with physical effort. In running such long and taxing distances, they answer a call from the deepest realms of their being – a call that asks who they are.” David Blaikie, Canadian ultra runner
- 12. Legitimate ultramarathon training technique
- 13. “’The more uncertain climbers felt about their possible success in reaching the summit;, as Kayes puts it, ‘the more likely they were to invest in their particular strategy.’ BOURKEMAN, Oliver. The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking. Canongate Books, 2013.
- 14. Totally acceptable pre-run meal
- 16. Who is the greatest runner ever? The person who gets the most joy out of it. Rory Bosio, The North Face ultra runner, UTMB winner (2013 and 2014), interviewed by The Guardian in July 2014
- 17. Thanks, people! You’re probably really nice! feedback, questions, love letters, offers of beer: supergenericgirl@gmail.com
Editor's Notes
- Hi. I’m Vera, otherwise known as Super Generic Girl. I hope you didn’t come here for my PowerPoint skills… Also, unlike Gayle, Brendan and Paul, who you’ll hear from next, I’m no expert. ON ANYTHING. So I’m not here to give you any advice. If I give you any advice, don’t take it. Althought that’s giving you advice so, I don’t know, you’re on your own. I have however been running for a while now so I guess we have that in common. I started running about 3 years ago with my friend Stacey. I wish I had a cool back story about how I was struggling with something and running saved me but, really, we just found ourselves eating too much curry and, both being too cheap to pay for a gym, decided to offset the curry eating with some runs around the block. Running was never a thing I thought I’d get into. Growing up – running = punishment. Also, had TB as a kid so have struggled with reduced lung capacity. Wait. Maybe I do have a cool back story… Anyway. We ran a half marathon that year and I thought “well, that wasn’t too awful. Maybe one day I’ll do it again”. This year I signed up for the 100km at Tarawera – yeah, on purpose – so you could say things have got a little out of hand.
- Because I wanted a way to document for myself all the events I was entering and the cool places I was getting to see through running, I started a blog – supergenericgirl. If I’d known it was going to become a bit popular and stick around for this long I would have put a bit more thought into the name.
- Through the blog, I got the opportunity, late last year, to become the editor of NZ Trail Runner magazine, the only magazine in the country dedicated to trail running. It comes out quarterly inside Wilderness Magazine and can be found in all good (and average and not so great) shops. You can also subscribe to it online which is what you should go and do when you get home today because that’s the only way I can afford my energy gels.
- But anyway. I started thinking about this presentation and trying to think about why it was that I stuck with running this whole time. I think I’ve figured it out. Six years ago I made the best decision of my life and moved to New Zealand to join you all awesome people. As smart a move as that was, it was also the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Sense of community. Fitting in. Language barriers. No hobnobs or Doritos to help with homesickness. The communities or tribes we fit into are what form our identity and I felt like I had none of that here. I’m not trying to give you a sob story here but if it’s working and making you want to buy me a beer after this then let me just add: poor, poor me. It was so hard you guys. But then I took up running.
- I met a bunch of like-minded people who never turned down my crazy ideas for running adventures. These are special people. You ask someone “normal” why they do something and they tell you “because I can”. You ask long distance runners and they’ll tell you “because I don’t know if I can”.
- I ended up creating friendships and strong bonds on the trails and realised that, out there, stripped of every social convention, we got to see who we really were. I felt like I’d finally found my people. Running came to the rescue again last year when I started freelancing. Lack of structure – routine. Running was something I could control. So that’s what running has given me and why I’ve invested so much time and effort into it.
- There’s a problem, though, and you may have picked up on this as well: running is really hard work. Really hard work. And I don’t like hard work. In fact, I go to great lengths to avoid hard work.
- Call it laziness, call it motivational-impairment. I call it efficiency. I like to achieve my goals with the minimum amount of effort possible. What I’ve come to realise, though, is that “efficiency” is actually a really good trait for a long distance runner. It’s not so great if you’re going for speed but it’s actually essential if you’re going the distance. So, finally, I had an excuse for my laziness.
- This is why I think we should all embrace it. Embrace efficiency. Celebrate it. Have a nap!
- The other reason I stuck with running, I now realise, is because long distance trail running is a good balance to all the comfort in my life. I’m not saying I don’t face challenges like everyone else but, overall, modern life for a middle class white girl is not too bad. I found that I craved the challenge and even the hardship that came with long distance running. Physical fitness, it turns out, was just a welcome bonus. It was about facing and overcoming challenges and, really, about finding my identity.
- If you don’t mind, I’d like to read you this quote from Canadian ultra runner David Blaikie because I think it really captures the point I’m trying to make. READ. Pause. So, really, it’s society’s fault. Modern life drove me to the trails. Long distance trail running, for me, is about fighting this short-termism epidemic and the urge for instant gratification. We have one-click downloads, same-day delivery, 2-minute noodles. Those 5 seconds before I’m able to skip the ad and load the YouTube clip feel like an eternity. For $2.50, someone will make me a cheeseburger or my money back. People used to embark in endeavours that they knew would take more than their lifetime to finish.
- I realised that, to fight the urge for instant gratification that was so cemented in my mind and lifestyle, I needed to train my brain more than my legs. I started reading a lot about brain elasticity and brain endurance theories and found that I was actually onto something. Because the idea of training the brain sounds a lot less exhausting than the idea of training my body, I was all over it. Long movies, thick books – all legitimate part of my ultra training. All from the comfort of my sofa or bed. I also adopted my own brain hacks to trick me into running longer distances. Accountability was important for me – social media Gamification Thinking of running as fun or play, rather than a workout or a chore.
- The other thing I think it’s important is to embrace negative thinking. I’m all for visualising the finish line and I don’t want to turn us all into Debbie Downers who think they’ll fail but I think it is important not to underestimate the fact that things might go wrong. Everest climbers – their complacency led to their faiure – Bankers – People taking mortgages after reading The Secret. It’s not that I always think it’s not going to work out but I think it’s good to appreciate that failure is an option if you let it happen and keeping that in mind makes me work harder to prevent that.
- I also made sure that, in order to stick to this running thing, I adjusted it to fit with my lifestyle rather than the other way around. I knew that if I had to make big changes to what I eat and stuff like that I would probably be put off by the whole thing. Plus, long distance running is the perfect excuse to eat all the crap you want without any guilt.
- One of the ways I like to reward myself after a good long run (or a good short run. Or any kind of run) is with decent beer. My beer app is a good measure of how my training is going so, looking at the numbers (and that’s just for this year), you can see I’m totally on track for this next ultra. Jokes aside though, since I’m not fast and don’t really care much about pace, speed, VO2 max or any other of those numbers, I decided to come up with an alternative and very much personal measure of a good run. To me, the measure of a good run is in other numbers. How many pretty photos I stopped to take, how many good conversations I shared with friends along the trail… how many beers I tried afterwards.
- Ultimately, you focus on whatever brings you the most satisfaction. To me, that is it. When someone asks me how my run went, those are the stats I think about. Rory Bosio has won UTMB twice so she knows a thing or two about long distance running. She says the best runner is the person who gets the most joy out of it. So, whatever your pace, I hope you get the most joy out of your runs and always go home feeling like the greatest runner ever.
- Thank you for listening to my ramblings and not throwing anything in my general direction. See you for a run on Saturday!