Race Goals: “ABC” or just an “A”?

July 9, 2015 Faux Runner Comments 2 comments

Over a recent conversation with Coach Mike, he mentioned that part of racing is learning how not to quit. That made me think of races and goals. (This is more of a rambling thinking out aloud post than a definitive answer post).

Race Goals – A ton of what I’ve read and been advised is to have ABC goals in a race. Why so many goals for a single race? The idea is to have a perfect day A goal, backup plan B goal and finishing/learning C goal. Chicago 2011 my first marathon had race goals, so did New Orleans 2012 and Chicago 2012 before the flu derailed everything.

Then there is “quitting“. The word “not to quit” means different things to different people in different situations. It could simply mean hanging in there, moving forward when race day has battered you. It could mean desperately digging deep to hang on to a pace. It could mean showing up, day after day, with that ultimate goal in your mind. I don’t give up. There is no option to quit, the only variable that is dependent on my giving up is the margin of success (For example – in a perfect racing scenario will it be a +30 seconds or +2 minutes better than goal time.)

Here is where I think it becomes a bit blurry for me.

When is it ok to have an ABC goal and how do you not fall back to lesser goals when the going gets tough, because by defining lesser goals you have given yourself permission to fall back and quit on your A goal?

For example – In the Peachtree 10k, coach gave me only one race goal. Either I met that goal, or I didn’t. Same thing with the Georgia Publix Half Marathon and Pittsburgh Half Marathon. There was no “If you are not able to do xx:xx pace at mile z, fall back to yy:yy pace” – a “B” goal. In either of the races, if I had had a “B” goal, it would’ve been way too easy to fall back to the B because my body always protests when I push it, and if the mind gives it permission to fall back, it will. I came close to a “B” in the Peachtree 10k, but there wasn’t a B goal, so I stuck to the only goal I had.

At the New Orleans Marathon where I PRed by 30min with 5:45 finish, my “A” goal was a 5:35-5:38 finish. I had trained for that all winter, but changed to “B” of 5:45 after just 10 miles on race day because I got afraid of the temps in upper 70s (that was the first hottest day after a long cold winter). If I had had no “B”, would I still have pursued my “A” until I could either successfully see it to the finish or until I blew up?

Race Goals – ABC goals vs A goal? Does defining a “B” goal give you permission to fall back? #fitfluential #runchat

Click To Tweet