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2010:Should you resolve to set better goals?
By Cindy King
``New Year's is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, friendly calls andhumbug resolutions.'' – Mark Twain
So have you broken your New Year’s Resolutions yet? Or have you not bothered to set any? 2010 has already started, but it is not too late to set some goals that will help you achieve what you want out of your running this year.
Setting goals sounds good in theory, but what about the elite athletes out there, whom many of us look up to. Do they set New Year’s resolutions? We spoke to a few Olympians who do.
World Championships and Olympic marathon representative Lisa Jane Weightman is very specific about her goals for 2010. She wants to run under 2hr30min in the marathon, run under 70mins in the half marathon, and to win a medal at the Commonwealth Games. (She definitely gets top marks for aiming high). However, she didn’t just make these goals on New Year’s Eve – she wrote them down as part of her 4-year plan that she created last year, and I am sure that through working with her coach and support team she has in place specific behaviours that will enable her to get what she is after.
``New Year's is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, friendly calls andhumbug resolutions.'' – Mark Twain
So have you broken your New Year’s Resolutions yet? Or have you not bothered to set any? 2010 has already started, but it is not too late to set some goals that will help you achieve what you want out of your running this year.
Setting goals sounds good in theory, but what about the elite athletes out there, whom many of us look up to. Do they set New Year’s resolutions? We spoke to a few Olympians who do.
World Championships and Olympic marathon representative Lisa Jane Weightman is very specific about her goals for 2010. She wants to run under 2hr30min in the marathon, run under 70mins in the half marathon, and to win a medal at the Commonwealth Games. (She definitely gets top marks for aiming high). However, she didn’t just make these goals on New Year’s Eve – she wrote them down as part of her 4-year plan that she created last year, and I am sure that through working with her coach and support team she has in place specific behaviours that will enable her to get what she is after.
Olympian Youcef Abdi wants to break the national and Oceania records in the 3000m steeplechase, and to make the World Athletics final. Lee Troop wants to “make sure 2010 is a productive year both on and off the running track.”
The above are dedicated and sponsored athletes who take a professional approach to their running. They not only set the above big goals, but they also figure out what specific activities are needed to achieve them. Youcef will be working with his support team to figure out what can shave those few seconds off his times, and Troopy will be figuring out exactly what ‘productive’ means and what he needs to do differently to achieve this.
However, many of us don’t have the background in the sport and the experience of achieving the running success of Lisa, Youcef and Troopy. We need to get a bit more specific about what we need to do differently to achieve our goals and resolutions for 2010.
In 2007, time management firm Franklin Covey surveyed 15,000 of its clients and found that 4 out of 5 people eventually break their resolutions. Nearly 40% said it was because they had too many other things to do, while 33% admitted that they were not really committed to the resolutions they had set in the first place. This failure to achieve ‘resolutions’ should not be solely blamed on the lack of dedication of the individuals themselves, but rather because people are making the *wrong* resolutions.
Experts say the reason many New Year’s resolutions fail is because they focus on imprecise outcomes (eg losing weight, getting faster) rather than the specific behaviors that will determine our ability to persevere to achieve the success we are after.
The above are dedicated and sponsored athletes who take a professional approach to their running. They not only set the above big goals, but they also figure out what specific activities are needed to achieve them. Youcef will be working with his support team to figure out what can shave those few seconds off his times, and Troopy will be figuring out exactly what ‘productive’ means and what he needs to do differently to achieve this.
However, many of us don’t have the background in the sport and the experience of achieving the running success of Lisa, Youcef and Troopy. We need to get a bit more specific about what we need to do differently to achieve our goals and resolutions for 2010.In 2007, time management firm Franklin Covey surveyed 15,000 of its clients and found that 4 out of 5 people eventually break their resolutions. Nearly 40% said it was because they had too many other things to do, while 33% admitted that they were not really committed to the resolutions they had set in the first place. This failure to achieve ‘resolutions’ should not be solely blamed on the lack of dedication of the individuals themselves, but rather because people are making the *wrong* resolutions.
Experts say the reason many New Year’s resolutions fail is because they focus on imprecise outcomes (eg losing weight, getting faster) rather than the specific behaviors that will determine our ability to persevere to achieve the success we are after.
For example, if your goal is to ‘avoid injury’, then this is pretty vague. How can you really be certain that you are avoiding injury? A more practical goal might be to say that you will stretch for 5 minutes a day, every day, no matter what. This means that if it is 10pm at night and you have not done your stretching, then you do it. Five minutes a day may not sound like much, but it will add up to 35 minutes a week. And what will probably happen is that many days you will finish your five minutes and decide to continue on with more. You will be achieving something practical that will lead to your goal of preventing injury
Some other practical and achievable resolutions you might want to set for this year to improve your health and running include:
- Making sure that you have a fortnightly massage (this could present a clash of values if you have another goal around saving money, but we’ll save that worry for another article!)
- Going to yoga or pilates at least once a week
- Getting a coach
- Joining a running group
- Setting up at least one standing ‘appointment’ with a friend to meet for a run per week, so that you know you will show up
- Limiting the number of resolutions that you make. Willpower is a limited resource. Creating new habits is not easy, and so it is best to just focus on one goal at a time, rather than saying that you are going to detox, train for a marathon, save more money, be more organized and spend more time with the kids this year. Pick one of these and go for it.
It’s not too late to make a conscious effort to improve your running and to set some goals for 2010. Get specific and you will have a much greater chance of achieving the same feeling of success that our elites do. You may not win medals, but you can still strive to become the best runner you can be.
Some other practical and achievable resolutions you might want to set for this year to improve your health and running include:
- Making sure that you have a fortnightly massage (this could present a clash of values if you have another goal around saving money, but we’ll save that worry for another article!)
- Going to yoga or pilates at least once a week
- Getting a coach
- Joining a running group
- Setting up at least one standing ‘appointment’ with a friend to meet for a run per week, so that you know you will show up
- Limiting the number of resolutions that you make. Willpower is a limited resource. Creating new habits is not easy, and so it is best to just focus on one goal at a time, rather than saying that you are going to detox, train for a marathon, save more money, be more organized and spend more time with the kids this year. Pick one of these and go for it.
It’s not too late to make a conscious effort to improve your running and to set some goals for 2010. Get specific and you will have a much greater chance of achieving the same feeling of success that our elites do. You may not win medals, but you can still strive to become the best runner you can be.
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