Be Flexible

Being flexible with my running schedule is very important to me. I’m very committed and will not miss a planned run easily, but due to a busy life between work and home I have to change my running plans form time to time.

My general schedule is to run six days a week, Tuesday to Sunday, with Monday a rest day. I’ve made this a rule, I never run on Mondays. So if anything happens and I can’t run on Sunday, I’ll have two rest days. I never use Monday to “catch up” on the run I missed on Sunday. I also rest Sunday and Monday when I do a long run or race on a Saturday.

This weekend turned out to be one of those. I planned a 4km run for Saturday and 15km for Sunday. I was looking forward to this since I’ve been feeling really good after the few days break at the beginning of the week. It turned out that I had to work this weekend though…Sunday morning 2am to 6am. Not the greatest hours of the day for work, but from time to time I have to work some odd hours. Luckily I’m one of not that many people who are passionate about my work and the only downside to the odd hours is the conflict with my running plans.

That said I’ve learnt over time that the downside runners tend to see when something messes with their running plans is actually a positive most of the time. More rest and more recovery time are never bad. I see any missed run as more rest and more recovery and always feel the benefit in the weeks to follow.

So I did my Sunday 15km on Saturday and will run Tuesday again. This means I get extra rest time and only miss 4km as result of the weekend work. The two days without running also helps me to recover from the lack of sleep over the weekend. All in all, by being flexible, I’m a happy camper with a great balance between work, running and life in general.