Love Letters to My Crew

Tuesday, February 17, 2026 – Listening

April 10, 2026/in Love Letters 2026/by RWadmin

Hi Everyone!

Hope you all had a great Family Day long weekend! Omigosh running with clear footing and good traction is a gift, isn’t it? Coming through hard things really does make you appreciate the better times when they arrive. Not to be overly dramatic about our winter weather.

Lately I’ve been thinking about the saying “Listen to your body”. I’ve used it with some athletes because I think our bodies are wise and can tell us things subtly. The trick though is how and when to “listen”. This is a tough one because as endurance athletes we are constantly trying to override our bodies’ signals to slow down or stop, in order to improve. When we do this enough, our bodies do eventually get in line. What used to feel like pain becomes merely uncomfortable, and we can even get into the habit of craving doses of that discomfort. We find ways to blunt the signals our bodies are sending, from changing how we interpret them, dissociating from them, or sometimes just seeing how long we can push through them for. And yes, the most successful endurance athletes do seem to be able do this the best. But the most successful athletes have also learned how to tune into the nuance of pain and discomfort, so they can understand when their bodies are telling them that something isn’t right.

For instance, if you’ve ever tried to run with an iron deficiency, you will gradually learn to distinguish that type of fatigue and heaviness from that which occurs with productive training. It feels hard, as does a lot of training, but it feels like the wrong kind of hard. Your body is telling you it needs help. Another signal is repeatedly getting sick, or injured, or a cycle of illness and injury. They might not all seem related to each other, but often that’s a signal that your body is run down. Maybe it’s just your sleep, nutrition or stress load that could use a little attention. That would be good because those are simple to address. (Note that I said simple, not easy!) When your body is healthy, pushing and working hard should feel good. Your body likes a certain amount of stress. And pushing through some signals of pain or discomfort is ok – as long as you build in recovery and rest and treat your body well afterwards. When we get the balance right, we are rewarded with increased fitness and stronger, faster bodies. It is easy to miss some of the early signals when our bodies are telling us it’s too much because we have normalized a certain degree of soreness and fatigue. But with time we’ll learn how to decipher whether that twinge was something to pay attention to, whether the fatigue was more than just learning to run on tired legs, whether the illnesses are just a string of bad luck. There is nuance in all of these things, and with experience we can all get better at listening and responding in time. I’ve already noticed that many in this group are getting better at it. And being in tune with and listening to our bodies is a life skill we can keep developing over a lifetime.

On to tomorrow’s workout! Back to Lakeshore and Leslie – 6:05 Drills, 6:15 GO!

I’m liking the mile endcaps for our marathoners.

Let’s do:

1 mile tempo

3 min rest

6 x 600 w 90

3 min rest

4 x 300 w 60

3 min rest

1 mile tempo (ppl training for 5K’s, don’t do the last mile, but instead lean into those 300’s!)

That is all – see you in the am!

Seanna

Tuesday, February 10, 2026 – Mind powers

April 10, 2026/in Love Letters 2026/by RWadmin

Hey Gang!

Happy end-of-the-cold-snap! I mean, it’s not warm, but it doesn’t feel life threatening anymore. I think we’re gonna make it, even though it snowed again and the footing still sucks. Way to go everyone for getting on with the show thus far – if you’re like me it may have taken a little toll on your sunny disposition, but I’m sure we’ll all bounce back to our easy-going, happy-go-lucky selves sooner or later. And until them, I’m working on my new book which I’m sure will become a New York Times Bestseller: “Don’t fucking let anyone!” (just kidding. Although…)

Anyway, this week I’ve been back to pondering the age-old mystery of the mind-body connection. I mean, some people even say that that is a false concept because the word “connection” implies they are two separate things, when in reality the mind and body are one thing. That all gets a little too deep for me, but it is interesting how much and how immediately they influence each other. And when we really start appreciating this, I think we can start to take control and guide ourselves a bit better.

Here are two examples in running from the past few weeks. My daughter was running her first ever indoor 1500m (I can tell this story because she has since had a redemption race). It is 7 ½ laps of the 200m track, so she just tucked into the pack to feel out how to pace herself. She felt great, was looking good and she came around to the lap counter and saw 2 laps to go. So she started moving up and getting ready to finish strong. Then she came around again expecting to see 1 lap and saw 2 laps to go again! They had miscounted. Her eyes went wide, her brain panicked, unused to the indoor track, her brain told her she had two laps of an outdoor track to go, and her body refused to keep up the effort. She suddenly couldn’t pick up her legs and she struggled to even make it through the last two laps. A week later, her brain understood where she was in space and time and she ran 13 seconds faster. Her body could do the exact same thing both times – it was how she was processing the effort which prevented her the first time and allowed her the next time.

Another athlete who I know ran one of the fastest 600m races in the country this year. This athlete is talented and great at workouts, but has struggled in being able to express his fitness in races in the past. This time he ran what everyone who knows him has believed he could run for years. I saw him after the race and he told me what he had figured out. He said it was pretty simple. He just calmed his mind before the race with his own ritual of music and tuning out everything else, and then during the race he forced in certain mantras like “you feel good”, and “this is going well”. He said it was amazing but it actually worked, helped him to relax and race his fastest, and set a school record.

I know we’ve all read stories like this, and know these things, but it’s easy to dismiss our mental narratives as less important when we’re working so hard physically. It doesn’t seem like it should make such a big difference, especially when it seems so simple. But we can get messages through to our bodies by programming them in. And our bodies will respond. Sometimes it’s a negative message that inadvertently gets through, but if we can keep forcing in the positive ones, we’ll be stronger and faster for it.

On to tomorrow’s workout – we’re back to hills!

I’ll aim to be at Pottery Rd around 6:10/6:15.

2 x 400 hill

5 min tempo

400/ 200 hill

5 min tempo

200/200/200 hill

5 min tempo

That is all – see you in the am!

Seanna

Tuesday, February 3, 2026 – Becoming great

April 10, 2026/in Love Letters 2026/by RWadmin

Hi Everyone!

We made it through January! Congrats to all of us. That was one long month. Here’s hoping February is a little smoother and a little warmer for all of us. If nothing else it will be shorter. I feel like we’re through the worst of it, but please don’t blame me if I’ve just cursed us to four more weeks of frozen hellscape.

Last week after one of my university track practices, a first year athlete asked me if we could chat. He was frustrated with himself because he is a talented runner, and came into the program knowing he’d be making a strong contribution to the team, but he felt he was letting himself down. He was doing well, but he wanted to be great. And he could see that his habits (2 am bedtimes, not running mileage consistently), were holding him back. We put together some strategies and realistic goals for him. My thinking was, well, obviously he doesn’t have it all figured out – he’s in first year university. But that stuff is easy and with some work will fall into place. My main takeaway was – he wants to be great! That is something you can’t coach into someone. That, and the fact that he wanted to improve, was all I needed to hear to want to invest in him.

I do see some athletes who seem to be missing this spark. They say, “well, I showed up”. And, ya… they did and that’s something. But it’s not exciting! Showing up should be the minimum bar, not something we’re shooting for and celebrating. There is something infectious about the drive of those who want to be great. They are taking risks and putting themselves out there and suffering with meaning for their craft. They want to be the best. Some might call this hubris or unrealistic or out of touch and lacking in humility. And I say – who cares? Life will bring them back to earth soon enough. Let them believe in their dreams.

I used to think this about Jakob Ingebrigsten, the Norwegian runner. He is 25 years old now, so not old, but over the last 5-7 years as he has been making a huge mark on track and field, he has shown up with a lot of swagger, confidence, and huge goals – many of them backed up, some still yet to be achieved. I have always been such a fan of his, and I’ve partly thought this is because of a sentimentality for his youthful optimism. Where some people were turned off by his swagger and confidence, I found it endearing. Like a little kid who wants to be a superhero. Let them get as far as they can – the pursuit and vision are meaningful and will take them far. And if life intervenes and they don’t achieve their full enthusiastic vision, it won’t be a huge shock to those of us who have been around the block. In fact, Ingebrigsten has since been taken down with injuries – tbd if he will make a full comeback.

So what to take from this? I think it’s to be celebrated when kids – or anyone – says they want to be the best. Let’s not say “well, not everyone can be the best, just show up and try”. We shouldn’t be telling them or ourselves that it doesn’t look good to have big goals. It becomes hard enough when experience tries to tell us what our place is. It also takes a lot of energy and some risk to believe wholeheartedly in ourselves. You might be called “too ambitious” or “a big ego” and people might try to bring you back to earth. But if anything makes us seem old, it’s complacency. There is a time and a place for treading water – we all need to sometimes. But that should not be the expectation we’re setting for ourselves or our kids. I say we should all put on our underoos and shoot for the stars or pick up our swords and go slay some dragons. Whatever dream charges you up. Go get it!

On to tomorrow’s workout – Back at Monarch Track! 6 am arrive, 6:15 start.

(I have paid for this session so $ should come to me – will give you a total after a head count)

If you don’t want to do a workout but want to come and run on good footing with a great crew, just come and run a social!

Everyone else:

1 mile tempo (can be MP into tempo)

3 min rest

3 x 1K w 2 min rest (5K>3K pace)

4 min rest

4 x 400 a lil faster w 1:15 rest

4 min rest

1 mile MP>tempo (optional)

That is all – see you in the am!

Seanna