Knowing When To Stop Is An Art
This spring I ran a 220km ultramarathon called Ultrabalaton, in Hungary. It was my second time there. First time was last year, when I finished in 31 hours and a half, paying a huge price: I got blisters the size of my fist in the soles and, overall, I was in a very bad shape. It took me six months to fully recover.
But the adrenaline of finishing it kinda pushed everything in the background. At that time, I thought this was a good thing. Not anymore.
This year I stopped at km 130, after 18 hours. Here's why.
Starting this year, organizers introduced cutoff times. Meaning you had to get to a certain checkpoint before a specific time of the day. This is a big change, especially for such a long race. It really impacts the way you train and the race strategy.
I didn't know about the cutoff times until two days before the race. So, I barely had time to adjust my strategy. But only 4 hours after the start, because of the heat (we were running at 33 degrees Celsius) the strategy blew out. I crawled from checkpoint to checkpoint, while blisters were forming again in my soles, bigger and bigger. I was lagging behind.
After sunset the heat became more bearable and I hoped I would be able to recover the lost time.
The critical checkpoint was at km 130. From there, the terrain was completely flat and the effort would have been significantly lower. The cutoff time for the 130km checkpoint was 30 minutes after midnight.
I got there at 0:12, quite happy, only to see an organizer telling me to give her the race number and the chip: I was disqualified for not making the cutoff time, which, apparently, was at 0:07. I was baffled. After 10 minutes of talking I realized there was a difference between the English version of the site and the Hungarian one. The English version wasn't updated with the latest cutoff time schedule, which was 0:07.
So, they gave me back the number and the chip.
I changed clothes and shoes and started to run again, trying to make up for the lost time.
But after a few hundreds of meters, I just stopped.
I got back to the checkpoint, gave back the race number and the chip and waited for a car to take me back to the hotel. I swallowed my pride. It wasn't easy.
But I felt way better than last year. The blisters healed in a few days and I was fully functional in a week.
Knowing when to stop is a very delicate art. And I learned that not only in running, but also in business. These days I'm closing down the business I ran for the last two and a half years in Bucharest and it is quite painful. It was never profitable, not even break even and it created a huge debt.
But the adrenaline of "trying to fix it" every day was kinda pushing everything in the background. For two and a half years I thought this was a good thing.
Not anymore.
(The good news, though, is that, once I settle down, I will have more time for Steemit.)
I'm a serial entrepreneur, blogger and ultrarunner. You can find me mainly on my blog at Dragos Roua where I write about productivity, business, relationships and running. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @dragosroua.
https://steemit.com/~witnesses
I've also gone on a lot longer than I should have and paid the price.
I'm still paying the price today, in that I can't really run any more.
Think of it like a circuit breaker - it's purpose is to prevent real damage.
A small bit burns out and can be replaced, but the main mechanics are protected by this loss.
For you, the circuit breaker cut in, preventing further damage.
That's a good thing :-)
That's a very good analogy, I love it. And I consider myself fortunate to still have circuit breakers.
I'm sorry for the fact that you can't really run anymore, did you try to take it easier? The human body does wonders sometimes.
Unfortunately for me I destroyed the soles of my feet - the pantar fascia, so any time I try to run for longer than about 20 minutes I end up being crippled for about a week.
This is damage from just one run where I should have stopped but chose to push on through the pain. Note - this was no in a competition. I was out running for fun!
I also have damage to both knees from a similar experience that means walking for long period is also quite painful.
If I had decided to stop and not push myself so hard, I would be fine today. But I chose to push, I always choose to push ;-)
I wish I 'd had working circuit breakers back when I was younger.
Have I learned my lesson? Not really.
I now have to wear glasses from working too hard on the computer and pushing myself to get work done, when I should have taken a break.
There are times when I just want to clip myself around the ears and tell myself to stop being such an idiot. But I don't think I'd listen to myself.
I'm stupid like that :-)
About the soles, I think you can rebuild the mythocondria. Do long warm baths with salt and walk barefoot. It took me months to heal but eventually it happened. As for pushing too hard, well, meditation always helps :)
Thank for that ;-)
I've tried meditation, but it's just not my thing. I can't get into it.
I walk 'barefoot' most of the time. I wear Vibram Five Finger shoes, which helps.
It is not as bad now as it was, but I'll still get twinges if i go to the gym and lift heavy, or walk for along while, or it is cold.
Winter is very hard for my body. ;-)
As you may have guessed I've been doing this sort of thing to myself for all of my life (51 years of it) so I have injuries on top of injuries, and for most of my life, taking time off to recover was not an option. If you don't work, you don't get paid. It's either work or starve, so you just have to carry on as best you can.
It's not a strategy I'd recommend, if you can avoid it ;-)
I'm learning that balance as we speak :)
Comment nesting limit reached - doh.
Good for you. Focus on your balance, *your health, your wellbeing and everything else will flow from that. :-)
Good luck ;-)
Wow, I must say that you have a talent for painting a picture with words @dragosroua! I felt like I was right there running along with you. Great post. Followed and Resteemed.
Thank you :)
Yup. Knowing when to say "WHEN" is definitely huge. It takes a strong personality and a humble heart to release an initiative or goal or business. (I've shut down a few myself.) But I try not to think of it as failure.
I believe it was Thomas Edison who said, "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." Sounds like winning to me :D
In the long run, yes, it's a winning. But now I have to deal with the debt.
I'm sory to hear that you'll close a business. For sure isn't an easy decision. And the decision became harder if it will come with debts. I was never able to find that "right" moment. And probably the best way to do that it's to establish from the beginning a "stop lost point" like in stockmarkets. But this is an assumption, I never test it.
I am very well aware of the stop loss concept and as a trader I used for a while. The problem is that the stop loss kept moving down before it was triggered. Until it can't move anymore and it was triggered but at that time it was way, way lower than it should have been.