Running Wild: How confidence can make us stronger runners

I have alluded often in previous articles to the importance of confidence in running, but I haven’t really taken the time to go in depth on this subject.

I think we all know how powerful of a thing confidence can be, but just how this applies to running can be a bit confusing and elusive. I don’t pretend to fully understand how confidence works in running, but this is a subject I have put a lot of thought into over the past decade.

I think confidence works in running in the same way that it works in most anything in life. If we really fully believe we can accomplish something then we most likely can. The main question then becomes, how can we build this confidence? How can we convince ourselves that we can be the runner that we feel like we want to be?

I don’t mean to imply that confidence can be used as a stand alone shortcut to being the runner you want to be. Certainly you have to do the training, and put your body through enough physical stress that it will make physiological adaptations that over time will allow you to run a little faster.

However, our bodies will not respond in the same way all the time to the same amount and same type of physical stress. Furthermore, no two people’s bodies will respond the same way to the same amounts and same types of physical stress. In this sense it is important to base your training on a constant process of trial and error. This process is also a really simple way to build our confidence.

It really can be this simple. You constantly gather ideas and information from other runners, coaches, or any resources you come across. Then you implement these ideas when they make sense to implement them. If something new seems to resonate, you keep doing it, because this inherently builds confidence. This is the first part of the process, and this is something that virtually everyone is doing in all areas of life all the time.

Next comes the importance of training specifically in ways that help build this confidence. If we’re feeling like we want to become better runners on technical trails we have to do more than just go out and run on technical trails. We have to run on technical trails in ways that make us feel like we’re improving. Sure, we need to challenge ourselves to get better, and sometimes this means running on terrain that might be a bit over our heads, and that might leave us feeling “beaten” by the trail, but ultimately we need to believe we are good technical runners to be good technical runners.

How then do we do this?

First, shorten your stride. There is a lot of evidence that a shorter stride is more efficient anyway, but more importantly it’s a lot easier to run smoothly on technical trails with a shorter stride. Your feet stay more directly under your center of gravity, leading to much better traction; and you have much more control over each footstep when you are taking short strides. Even if you’re going slower at first, you will very quickly gain confidence in how much easier it is to negotiate the terrain, and in no time you will find yourself running much faster on technical terrain with this shorter stride.

Next, find a technical trail that you enjoy and run it a few times a week. I’ve often used the Mount Roberts trail for this purpose. By doing this you get to know the trail really well. You can eventually memorize every rock, root, stump, and almost know ahead of time where to place your feet. As you memorize more and more of this trail, it will feel significantly easier to run than it does initially. With this your confidence will increase, and when this occurs you will not just feel like a better trail runner, but you will in fact be a better trail runner. When you take this higher level of confidence to other technical trails you might feel like you’re not that good, but you will likely be running smoother and faster than you previously could without even realizing it.

Here’s another method which I highly recommend to increase confidence:

Take measures to make yourself feel good about your hard and/or long training runs. Nearly every distance runner does long runs as part of their training. Most also do speed/interval runs as well. Certainly there is a physiological benefit to building endurance through long runs, and building speed through intervals, but I think it’s really hard to get much benefit from these workouts if we don’t feel good about them.

There are different ways to do this, but the simplest is to intentionally put yourself in a position to feel good about these runs. Don’t go into your longest or hardest run of the week totally tired out from staying up late drinking a six pack. Not that you can’t do a long Sunday morning run on three hours of sleep and a hangover (trust me, this can be done), but you are almost certainly going to feel better if you don’t have the hangover and the lack of sleep. There might not be a huge difference in what your body takes physically out of either method, but it’s not going to do a whole lot for your confidence if you finish the run feeling horrible.

Instead, try to create conditions in which you end these long runs feeling good. Sleep and eat well the day or two before; start the run at a really easy pace so you can finish feeling strong; eat and drink enough to stay fully nourished and hydrated during the run. Doing long runs will likely make you a stronger distance runner no matter how you feel (as long as you’re giving yourself enough rest after the run), but doing long runs in which you finish feeling great and, thus, really confident will make you a much stronger distance runner. More benefit from the same workout. Seems like a good idea.

Of course, it’s not entirely this simple. Gaining confidence isn’t as easy as just saying: “Take measures to gain confidence.” Sometimes we just feel sluggish no matter what we do, and other times we feel great when we are convinced we won’t. Sometimes we trip over dozens of rocks on a trail that we’ve run a hundred times and then hop on a trail for the first time and feel great. For the most part though, we will feel better in our runs when we make a conscious effort to do the little things that typically give our bodies the tools it needs to do so.

When this all comes together just right, we create a positive feedback loop that boosts our confidence, and this confidence is absolutely invaluable in making us the stronger runners that we want to be.

• Geoff Roes lives and runs trails in Juneau. He has run more than 40 mountain, ultra, and trail running races all over the world – winning the majority of them. He is the founder and director of the Juneau based Alaska Mountain Ultrarunning Camp. He can be reached at grroes@yahoo.com and more of his insights can be found on his personal website www.akrunning.blogspot.com.