By Coach Adolfo Salgueiro

All of us runners have been there. And if you haven’t, keep running and you will: Missing the PR we trained for. Walking on a run we thought in which we were supposed to excel. Beaten by that one person that can’t even keep up with us in training. Selling ourselves a valid excuse for what just happened. We have just failed!

Sure, failure sucks. There is no other way to put it or sell it to ourselves or to our friends. But it doesn’t have to be final. It critical to your growth as a runner. And as a person.

It happens, learn your lessons and move foward (Photo: Polina Zimmerman, Pexels)

There is an excellent quote by Jimmy Dugan, played by Tom Hanks in the movie A League of Their Own, when one of the players tells him she’s no longer enjoying baseball because it has become too hard: “It’s supposed to be hard. If it wasn’t hard, everyone would do it. The hard…is what makes it great!\”

So, how do we embrace something that sucks, hurts and yet could be beneficial, and make it the cornerstone of our running growth? I suggest these steps:

1 – Accept your feelings: Don’t suppress your emotions after the failure. Don\’t put a façade for your buddies. These feelings are normal, healthy and must be worked through your system so they may be processed.

2 – Step away from guarded mode: Ok, you failed. So what? Is your wife going to leave you? Are your friends disowning you? You have processed your emotions and accepted what happened. It is time to stop dwelling on it and move forward.

3 – Find the lessons to be learned: What happened? Why? Was it an external factor or was it something under your control? What will you do differently next time? Identify the factors that assisted with the failure and strategize on how not to allow this to happen again. If it was your error, own it.

4 – Embrace the failure: Now that you know what happened, why, and how to avoid it next time, it is time to focus on your next objective. You have accepted that a flop does not reflect your value as a person. Even if you missed the Olympic gold medal. It is, though, an opportunity for growth. The runner who hasn’t failed, just hasn’t run enough.

5 – Enrich yourself by what you\’ve learned: A long time ago, I heard someone (I can\’t recall who) say that \”what you get when you don\’t obtain what you originally set out for, is experience\”. Make this experience part of your narrative. Share your story with others letting them know that setbacks are a natural obstacle in the path to success.

I have compiled a list of failure-related quotes by people from all walks of life. These quotes corroborate that failure can only become a permanent mark in your life when you either keep dwelling on it or you don\’t learn anything from it.

Tak advantage of the opportunity (Photo: Brett Jordan, Pexels)

► \”I have not failed. I\’ve just found 10,000 ways that won\’t work\” – Thomas Edison.

► \”Some sessions are stars, and some are stones, but in the end, they are all rocks and we build upon them\” – Chrissie Wellington, four-time World Ironman Champion.

► \”A bad run is better than no run\” – Unknown.

► \”Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better\” – Samuel Beckett, Playwright, novelist, Nobel-laureate.

► \”Relish the bad training runs. Without them it\’s difficult to recognize, much less appreciate, the good ones\” – Pat Teske, Resilience expert, health advocate, coach.

► \”We all have bad days and bad workouts, when running gets ugly, when split times seem slow, when you wonder why you started. It will pass\”– Hal Higdon, legendary running writer.

► \”There will be days you don\’t think you can run a marathon. There will be a lifetime of knowing you have\” – Unknown.

► \”Get over it – If you have a bad workout or run a bad race, allow yourself exactly 1 hour to stew about it, then move on\” – Steve Scott, former U.S. record holder in the mile.

► \”If you never have a bad day, you\’re probably doing something wrong; if you never have a \’good\’ day, you\’re definitely doing something wrong\” – Mark Remy, Runner\’s World.