Bigger and better....

It's easy to be inspired nowadays. The world is full of inspirational quotes and motivational phrases that make you think "I can do this". 

But to get any benefits from motivation you have to approach it with a positive mind.

And the last week has taught me this lesson more than ever.

I'll explain.

You see kids, every runner eventually picks up niggles and pains. It comes for all sorts of reasons, running too much, running to far or fast, new shoes, old shoes; the list is almost endless. And a week ago I found myself out on a run with a recurrence of patellofemoral pain syndrome (PPS). This feels like a tightening inside the knee, it's painful to extend the knee, when running but even more so when you stop. The reason for it is unclear, but it's thought to be an alignment issue with the knee cap. The discomfort is accompanied with a nice crunching noise when you bend/flex the knee.

Rest is required, and then there are exercises you can do to better tone the muscles involved to better align the parts involved. 

Long story short, I found myself with a prescribed 2 weeks off running and some new exercises to try out to better condition and gone my legs. As a runner, not running is tough. 

Suddenly, everywhere I looked people were running. They looked happy and pain free.

I hated all of them, obviously!

I also had to consider my involvement in a 62 mile ultramarathon I have coming up in ten weeks.  Training runs have been cancelled for a while and I started to think that maybe I'd had enough of running ultras. My mood was kept up by positive comments from friends and twitter folk.

I started my exercises and after a couple of days, my legs felt stronger. After 5 days my knee felt great, as strange as that sounds, and my legs were feeling better than ever! 

 I started to think I could come back better than before.

Stronger than before.

With the 62 miler back on track, I woke on Saturday to a message from a friend..

"Don't forget, entries open for Thames Path 100 today"

It was then that I looked back at my week. Despite setbacks in my work, I felt positive. I'd turned a negative of an injury into a way to improve my strength and running. I was feeling positive and motivated!

And like an inspirational writer wrote recently, sometimes when a challenge scares you, you have to say yes.

I could have said no. It would have been easy to be honest. Training for ultras is tough and a 100 is awesome and ridiculous all at once. 

The challenge scares me. Because it makes me want to try harder than ever. Because I want to run it, or parts of it with others that inspire me and who I hope to inspire.

And because at the end of the days it's one hundred bloody miles!

Kids I guess what I'm saying is, look for inspiration from others, but don't wait for them to push you. When you're scared, think carefully. You might just be on the edge of achieving something amazing. And like I've old you before, never be afraid to say yes.

Thank you for all of the positive messages I got after entering Thames Path 100, never underestimate how much they help people.