How to Make Running More Like a Soft Pillow and Less Like a Hundred-Pound Yoke

Too often I hear people express disbelief when I say that I like to run. It’s not like I’m saying I like to toss snakes or go flying over rows of buses on my dirt bike. Plenty of people run for lots of great reasons. Running probably won’t be fun if you don’t eat a healthy diet or go on short runs just a few times a week. But once you start running longer distances — longer than a mile or two, let’s say — and you become a faster runner, running can genuinely become more enjoyable. It’s been fun for me over the years to the point where I sincerely call it a joy in my life. Here are just a few ways you can make running a little more fun in your life and not feel like so much of a chore.

1. Run striders barefoot on grass. Now what is a strider? A strider is essentially you slowly accelerating over the course of 100 meters, hitting a peak of about 95% maximum speed about 80 meters in, and slowly slowing down. Striders can be used to help you warm up or cool down after a long run. The whole point of running striders is to essentially loosen up your muscles and to reinforce good running form, which may fall apart if you’re on a long, tiring run and are favoring one leg over another or keeping your shoulders tense. Focus on your turnover during striders and try to get it at an efficient rate (around 160 steps per minute and higher.) It may feel unnatural, but running with a higher turnover will help you run faster than running in your natural gait. (I know. It sounds counterintuitive, but there are multiple studies out there that show this.) You don’t have to run barefoot, of course. Keep your shoes on and spare yourself the agony of stepping in so much goose poop if you live where I live. But, well, running barefoot makes me feel like a prehistoric hunter-gatherer, and running on grass with morning dew can be a slippery adventure.
2. Run with friends. Join a running club in your area if your friends don’t run. (Then you can make new friends. Hooray!) People in a running club, of course, will most likely be training for the same event and may not want to deviate from their running schedule. But if you can get a bunch of people together, you may want to try the following experiment.
3. Go on a chalk run. (Requires multiple people.) This is something I did in high school cross country and was thrilled by the chase. Here’s how you do it: Split into two groups. One group starts running while the other group closes their eyes. The running group then has to mark on the sidewalk and on the street arrows pointing in whatever direction they’re heading in. Get one, or two, or three people to draw arrows in chalk, but also get ready to book it. You’ll have only ten minutes to run as fast as you can across parking lots, through alleys, and down dead ends if you prefer. Once the ten minutes are up, the group back at base can open their eyes and begin chasing you. The first group should wind their way through streets and return to base before the second group catches up with them.
4. Run fartleks. Fartlek is a Swedish word meaning “speed play”, although high schoolers will never cease to joke about this word. Running fartleks is interval training while continuously running and will help you become a faster runner. Here is what fartlek training can look like:

1. Warm up with a jog for about five, ten minutes.

2. Run quickly (maybe 80% maximum speed) for one minute.

3. Run slowly for two minutes.

4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for ten minutes.

5. Cool down with a jog for about five, ten minutes.

You don’t have to run in time intervals, of course. Pick a landmark, like a mailbox or telephone phone, on your running route and choose one of the above steps as you run toward it. Mix up your running speeds and distances, too. For example, you could run fast for 100 meters and slow for the next 200 meters, but then choose to end the workout (before the cooldown) with a fast 400 meters at 90% maximum speed.

5. Run in a neighborhood you have never ran in before. This will prompt your brain to remember your environment (houses on a street, a park, a church with a huge steeple, and so on) as you create a route on the fly and try to figure out how to get back to your car (or back home.) Think of it as an exercise against the insanity of running the same route repeatedly. When I lived in Mexico, I ran through some interesting neighborhoods in Cuernavaca and actually ran past what felt like somebody’s backyard. There were literally two dogs chained on both sides of me as I passed, one to a post, the other to a tree, almost within chomping distance. My point is that it wouldn’t hurt to carry dog spray with you. (And I haven’t even talked about the times I did get chased by dogs.)

6. Run at night. Again, take the necessary precautions, such as wearing bright, reflective clothing so that drivers can see you. Bring a canister of mace if that provides some peace of mind. The great thing about running at night is how suddenly the world can seem still. There is nothing that exists beyond you, the road, the route, the stars, the trees, the wind that pushes you along. You may find yourself dwarfed in stature by the great immensity of the firmament.

7. Run at a conversational pace. If you are a beginning runner, you may have the expectation that you must constantly perform on your runs or that you must continually improve. Hogwash. Balderdash. Tommyrot. Codswallop, I say. Half of the time I run, three days out of the week, I run at a conversational pace, meaning that I’m able to have a conversation with whomever I may be running. (Granted, I run alone most of the time.) If you’re trying to get a good gauge as to whether or not you’re running at a conversational pace, be the maniac who talks to him or herself on your run. Are you out of breath? Slightly? Well, can you comfortably keep a conversation going with Billy, your running partner? Then we’re good!

8. Get in the zone. I have no advice, only guesses, as to how to do this since I have gotten “in the zone” only a few times in my life on a run. Getting in the zone means achieving a flow state where you find yourself getting out of your own way in performing a task. You feel no hesitation, but rather that you have done this thing all your life and this time at a much higher level of performance. If I can dangle one carrot in front of people thinking of beginning running, it is this “in the zone” carrot. There are very few things that are better in life, in my opinion, than getting “in the zone” on a run. It’s not so much that I feel indestructible when I’m in the zone. It is more so that you find yourself wholly focused on running and find it deeply satisfying when you are doing it. Not after, when you are running. You’re not looking around the neighborhood at anything that moves like passing cars or innocent neighbors getting their mail. Every part of you feels perfectly synchronized to move quickly. Your breathing is measured, but you aren’t suffering from oxygen debt. Your arm movements are in sync. If there is a pothole in the road, you run comfortably around it or over it without breaking your rhythm. You feel like you are at the same time in total control of your body, but that some spirit is using your body as a vessel. Running becomes almost effortless. Now, how you can get in the zone and achieve this seemingly otherworldly feeling is hard to say. Listening to music may help, whether that’s you wearing a pair of headphones on your run or replaying in your mind a particular song that has a relentless rhythm you can run to. However you can reach it, running in the zone is an elusive feeling that cannot be forced into being.

9. Run in a race. It may feel like you’ve taken an adrenaline shot to the heart and you may feel terrified to do it, but let me counter that by saying fret not. Physiologically, anxiety and excitement are almost similar. You experience the same physical symptoms: an elevated heart rate, sweaty palms, and nervousness. Now, I don’t believe it helps to try to calm yourself down if you’re feeling this way. Rather, I think it’s better if you, let’s say, reinterpret those physical symptoms. Say that you are excited to show other people how great you are like Muhammad Ali does here. (You’ve spent all this time training. Think about how well you could do in this race! The possibility of a personal record is certainly worth getting excited about.)

10. Race against traffic. Again, please take precautions when you do this. When I lived in Cuernavaca, I would run down a winding hill for about half a mile. The sidewalks were pretty narrow and sometimes would be blocked with customers checking out a vendor’s goods, so then I would run in the street. There would be enough traffic and enough speed bumps for the traffic to slow down enough for me to keep pace with a car for a half mile. You probably really shouldn’t do this. It’s too dangerous, but I think my point still stands. Pick something moving in the distance and run after it. Try to catch up with cyclists and walkers and other runners. (Keep moving on once you do, of course. Not everybody loves random conversations with strangers.)

There you have it. Hopefully, these tips will lead you toward new running adventures. To all you running warriors out there, I salute thee. May you run with the strength of a thousand horses.