Everybody is different. This seems intuitively obvious. But why then, do most training programs and advice start with the premise that "this worked for someone else, it should work for you"? Even when advice targets a group of similar athletes, there is still a broad assumption that everyone in that category is equivalent in skill and the advice will work well. But within a category of experience, skills are typically quite different. Everyone comes with their own strengths and weaknesses. Consider that:
- You have unique physiology, reasons for running, lifestyle and preferences.
- You have genetic potential which may be limited by the size of your bones, limb length, muscle leverage, etc.
- You have had unique prior experiences, environment, and diet.
There is no chance that you are the same as anyone else much less a group of people. We will all respond to physical and mental challenges differently. Two people with similar builds, age and experience may respond completely differently to the same training run, strength training routine or running shoes. One may have experience running in the heat, the other not so much. One may have an injury history that impacts their running, the other duck feet, and so on. We also change over time, get better at some things, worse at others, change our nutrition or environment, etc. What worked for us at one time may not anymore. How can we know if something is effective for us at a particular point in time?
Fortunately, our brains can tell us! You just have to know how to ask. You can perform assessments to understand whether what you are doing is beneficial at that particular time. Assessments are critical in determining what your brain considers threatening or non-threatening to you. It might be worth thinking of something that assesses well as reducing overall threat and something that assesses poorly as increasing threat. And the greater the threat, the more your brain is going to constrain your performance. Think of it as putting on the brakes. Conversely, reducing threat by performing beneficial activities, is like stepping on the gas.
For example, a pebble in your shoe is very unlikely to assess well. Your brain can predict that left unattended, the pebble will likely cause harm. You will likely perceive pain and a reduction in performance until you fix the problem. But, that's going to be pretty common for everyone. Now imagine two people wearing the same make of shoe. It may be perfect for one runner and awful for the other. And neither may be able to cognitively perceive the difference. However, their non-conscious brains will perceive the difference and the shoes will assess differently for each.
At NeuroRunner, we use these individual assessments to help you:
- Find ways to tune-up your performance mid-run
- Find the best warm up
- Improve your training results
- Measure improvement
- To pick the right equipment, etc.
You will find that you are not always conscious of threat, so assessments are critical. Over time you may find that you become more intuitive about the process and be able to feel a positive response to a change. But by assessing regularly, you will improve the specificity, efficiency and results of your training over training advice that worked for someone else.