#555 Which belief is running your injury recovery? - DOC

#555 Which belief is running your injury recovery?

Which belief is running your injury recovery? Well that’s what we’re talking about today on the Doc On The Run podcast.


1. Faith

2. Doubt

Faith and doubt are both beliefs.

Let’s talk about a runner who wants to run a 4-hour marathon. You sign up for the Houston Marathon and want to make sure you can finish that race in 4 hours.

There’s couple of ways you could find out whether or not you’re going to achieve your goal.

1. Put on your shoes, run out the door, ago 26 miles and see how long it takes.

2. Go run 1 mile and figure out your magic number based on well-established calculations using a VO2Max calculation.

Marathon = 9:09

Mile Time = 7:29

(Magic Number) Easy Run = 10:11-11

Threshold = 8:32

Mile Repeat= 7:17

Just go to docontherun.com, click on the podcast for this episode we will have a calculator that you can use to put in these numbers for your marathon, with your goal time to show you what should be your training targets if you’re trying to achieve that specific goal. My guess is you may already know how to do this. The point of this episode is not to teach you how to train but to teach you understand what to do when you’re injured.

If you go out and you run 1 mile in seven minutes you should have confidence you can run marathon in four hours. That gives you faith. You will then be more motivated to run incomplete mile repeats at around 7:15 pace, because you have faith in been able to do that will help you run your marathon in under four hours.

When I think about these concepts with injured runners the way I think about it is simple.

If you have Faith, you will move faster in the right direction, with more confidence toward a goal.

If you have Doubt, the anxiety and fear created by uncomfortable anxiety robs you of action.

One runner might get faith from an X-ray. The doctor took an x-ray of the foot and said there was good news. There was no crack in the bone so I do not have a stress fracture. So I’m going to start training today and start getting my running fitness back.

That exact same runner might get doubt from the same x-ray. The doctor took an x-ray of the foot and said that there was no crack visible on the x-ray, but it might have just not showing up on the x-ray, or it could be a stress reaction in the bone which wouldn’t show up on the x-ray but which is defined as a Grade 2 stress fracture. So I’m going to wear the fracture walking boot for another two weeks, do nothing but sit around and wait then get another x-ray in a couple weeks.

If you’re taking action to maintain your running fitness, you have faith you’re going to get better.

If you’re doing nothing to maintain your running fitness it’s because you have doubt.

But don’t let this example convince you that there is only one way to decide whether or not you can do something to maintain your running fitness. No matter what the specific injury, there is always some action, some step you can take to gain confidence, move from Doubt to Faith and start getting back on the right track.

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