Now I have your attention, let me clarify what I mean about racing “naked” Over the past few years, whenever I was training for a race I religiously used my Garmin, to set miles/pace etc and I trained to the beeps of my watch. At times I didn’t look forward to the taskmaster that was my Garmin and sometimes the pleasure of running went away because of the rigidity of the bleeps and running at certain speeds.
I recently ran the D33 Ultramarathon and I used my Garmin for my training but when I reached my taper I decided just to do runs, without the Garmin (I ran naked) A week before the D33 I did a lovely 13 mile run along the beach and over the cliffs, a quite hard run but it was a lovely day and I enjoyed it. The following day I decided to turn up and enter Nairn 10km, the thought behind it was just to enter and just run, no time pressure, no pace pressure, just run as I feel. The race started and I ran as I felt and I felt good, surprisingly after my 13 mile the day before. I enjoyed running the 10km and chatted to various people on the way round. After I finished the timings were put up fairly quickly and imagine my surprise when I realised I had ran a PB for this course by 5 seconds.
All the way round I felt really strong and comfortable and I didn’t have my Garmin telling me to “run faster” “run slower” It was a lovely way to run and one we should maybe all do, forget the technology, just go for a run “naked” and get back to enjoying just running. I have another 10km this weekend and then I am running a Marathon the following weekend. I think I am just going to run both of these races as I feel and see how it goes. I do enjoy using my Garmin and I use it regularly but I think I will not use it as regularly as I once did and every now and again just “run naked” Why not try it yourself and see how it feels. It might increase your enjoyment of running and racing.
