Spend less time planning your run and more time running. If you typically run 9 minute miles on your recovery runs, leave your Garmin plugged in, don’t go on mapmyrun.com, and simply run for 90 minutes and call it 10 miles.

Sure, you might run 9.9 miles or 10.2 miles, but this will enable you the freedom to explore and run by feel. Enjoy a recovery run instead of ensuring that you hit your goal recovery pace. Goal recovery pace is redundant because the goal of a recovery run is to recover. When you don’t know the route, it is hard to judge your run. This can be a good thing.

Recommended Read: You Are A Morning Runner

I just read a great blog entry by The Rhonton Family that read “I need to somehow get back to feeling like I’m just running for the fun of it. I need to stop thinking about my agenda of going faster, increasing my miles, and being able to run this 13.1 miles. I just need to head out the door with the purpose of enjoying myself and feeling good afterwards no matter what the outcome is. Or… at least that’s what I’ll tell myself. Running is fun… RIGHT?”

By simply enjoying the freedom to run wherever your little heart desires, you will start to understand the joy of recovery sessions in between workouts that make your head spin.

About the Author: Brandon Laan is a runner, coach, and entrepreneur. He spent his undergraduate days at The University of Western Ontario where he captained the Cross Country Team before fleeing to Hawaii Pacific University for graduate school. He is a Level II Certified USATF coach and holds personal bests of 1:06 and 2:21 in the Half Marathon and Marathon respectively. He also enjoys running to eat, not eating to run…and always will.

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