Amateur Runners Need Motivation — Pros Stay Committed
6 Tips Run Form + My Sub-3 Marathon Training Update
What You’ll Learn
📊 Why Amateur Runners Need Motivation and Pros Stay Committed
🏃🏽♀️Improve your Running Form with these Six Tips
🗒️ My Marathon Training Updates
📊Why Amateur Runners Need Motivation and Pros Stay Committed
Want to run forever? Treat this unsexy anti-hack like a drug.
The difference between success and failure is rarely inspiration. It’s something far less sexy — It’s showing up. Amateurs wait for motivation, but the pros? They just do the work and stay committed to consistently showing up. Regardless of how they feel, they just get it done. Consistency is the only fuel that outlasts the spark of motivation and inspiration.
The Myth of Motivation
Motivation is like that friend hyping you up at a party to stay out later, keep drinking, and keep dancing.
Consistency is the alarm clock that gets you to your early-morning flight when you want to sleep in. One is fleeting and situational; the other gets you where you need to go.
And science backs this up, too! Dopamine isn’t just a pleasure chemical; it’s actually more looked at as the fuel for pursuit. It rewards you for the chase, not just the catch. If you can learn to crave progress and even process itself, motivation becomes pointless.
Examples: Two Runners, One Truth
The Dreamer Who Wants to Run Farther
This runner’s longest run to date is 60 minutes at a steady pace. They want to run a half marathon, which means building up to two hours and fifteen minutes (135 minutes). Simple progressive overload math: add five minutes a week for 15-20 weeks (give a few weeks as recovery weeks). No hype. No magic. Just patience, consistency and focus.
The Grinder Who Wants to Run Faster
This runner’s best 5K time is 16:45. They want to break 16 minutes. That’s 46 seconds to shave off in two years—about three to four seconds per month. Less than a second per kilometer (half-mile). It’s not dramatic, but neither is progress. One second faster today opens up a lifetime of new limits.
Why This Matters | The Real Reward
Commitment to consistency is like an airplane reaching cruising altitude. The initial climb requires the most energy—overcoming gravity, wind resistance, and drag. But once at 30,000 feet, the thinner air and forward momentum reduce the effort needed to maintain speed. The hardest part isn’t staying in motion; it’s getting there in the first place.
Want to know the secret? Tracking the progress is what keeps you going. So does writing down your splits and seeing your mileage slowly creep up. It’s like a healthy crack addiction. It turns the grind into a long-term game that you can play forever.
🏃🏽♀️Improve Your Running Form With These 6 Tips
I used to obsess over my own running form, constantly thinking, ‘Do I look like I know what I’m doing?’ But then I realized, running isn’t a beauty contest. It’s about efficiency—what works for your body, not someone else’s. In this episode, I’ll help you figure out what that means for you so you can run smoother, faster, and with way less stress.
Tip 1: Foot Strike - The Start Of Your Form and Stride
Let’s talk foot strike—how your foot hits the ground when you run. It’s one of those things runners love to overthink, so let’s break it down and clear up some myths.
First up, heel striking. Here’s the deal: it’s not the villain we once thought it was. New research shows that heel striking doesn’t directly cause injuries. The real culprit? Overstriding. That’s when your foot lands way out in front of your body, creating a braking force that slams your joints and slows you down. Modern running shoes, especially super shoes with higher stack heights, have made heel striking way less of a problem by softening the impact.
Don’t just take my word for it—there’s a study from Gruber et al. that backs this up. They found that heel striking isn’t inherently harmful; it’s the combination of heel striking and overstriding that’s the issue. In other words, it’s not about what part of your foot hits the ground—it’s where it lands in relation to your body.
Now, for most runners, midfoot striking tends to hit the sweet spot. Why? It’s better for running economy. When you land closer to your center of mass, you reduce braking forces and transition more efficiently through your stride. It’s smoother, lighter, and less taxing over time.
Forefoot striking? Unless you’re sprinting, it’s probably overkill. Landing on your toes shifts a lot of stress to your calves and Achilles, which can lead to injuries like tendinopathy or calf strains.
So what’s the takeaway? Don’t stress about being a heel, midfoot, or forefoot striker. If you’re comfortable, injury-free, and not overstriding, you’re probably fine. But if you’re looking to improve your efficiency, aiming for a midfoot strike and reducing overstriding can be game-changers.
Bottom line: Foot strike isn’t one-size-fits-all. The goal is to make running feel easier, not force yourself into someone else’s ideal.
Tip 2: Posture – The Foundation
This is your base—if it’s off, everything else falls apart.
Keep your shoulders relaxed, chest open, and head neutral (not craning forward like you’re checking your phone mid-run).
Picture a string pulling you up from the top of your head. Tall, but not stiff. Why it matters: Good posture sets the tone for everything else. Slouch, and you’re burning energy you could be using to move forward.
Listen, read or watch the other four tips here.
🗒️ Sub-3-Hour Marathon Training Updates
Things are chugging along mostly as expected almost six weeks out from the Ballarat, Victoria (Melbourne) Australia Marathon. Considering this is the first time I’ve properly trained for a marathon, I’m having way less issues than I did before when I jumped into an Ironman Triathlon before even doing my first marathon). I did, however, train slowly for four years before I did my first marathon, so there was some structure, patience, and consistency.
What I didn’t expect when I committed to this marathon was that my life would get exponentially more complex.
It first started with a lot more work coming in than usual with my content production business for health/fitness/medical companies & brands. While having work is not something I’ll complain about; I didn’t plan for this as I had another plan to grow the business differently.
I had our main audio/video editor move to a new country and leave the company. This means I needed to find someone and train them on processes, etc.
I then had a huge schedule shift and shorter work days with my son starting school was the ironic cherry on top to go with my body fatigue-ridden weeks.
If I was coaching myself, I’d probably say “Hey Daren, you should probably chill out from something”. But I also know that whenever I push myself slightly, I realize I’m capable of more than I was before the stressor. It’s a bit of a risk and something I’ll most likely never do again (pile on all of these adjustments and variables at the same time). But I only have six more weeks, so there is an end in sight.