That is the title of my next book (so don’t steal it). Obviously I need to get my current book out which should happen soon, I have contracts with the printers now.

Anyhoo this is to let you know about a talk I am giving next month which I hope you can attend. It is with mark Hines who is a bit of an explorer himself and writer of many ultra-marathon and nutrition books. I recommend reading them if you are interested in running in extreme climates or have an interest in the science bit.

Mark will be talking about injury with a focus on prevention which I think will be of great interest to all runners.

I will be presenting a story of what I have learned about the human brain while running. I have been running ultras for about 7 years now and when I got into it I didn’t appreciate that I will be participating in an intense and long term psychological study of one but that is what I have done. The past couple of years I have been reading and studying psychology and when reading through the text books I look at some phenomena and say “I remember that”.

I think anyone studying psychology should spend a summer running across the States as I reckon you learn more about the human brain while puking your guts up on the side of a road in New Mexico than you would in a lecture theatre.

The talk is going to be a combination of the stuff I have run and what I learned about my brain in the process, including;

What motivates it in general and throughout a race
How to deal with stress and paranoia that will attack you in a race
What to do when the task feels overwhelming, or boring, or pointless?
How to use your mental training to deal with novel event that might pop up in races
Some general tricks on making yourself feel awesome

Ultimately I hope to answer the question “Why I bother?”

Hope to see you there.

RunningandStuff