Post Run Routines

What to do after a long run?

If you do something often enough you form habits and the routine takes over. When that happens you cease to pay full attention and you just get on with doing what you always do. For that reason habits are very useful – they allow you to do things efficiently, but sometimes they get in the way of appreciating what you are doing.
One of the reasons I run is to help me look at things more clearly – blow away some of the fog that is always drifting around my mind. When you stop there is a chance, jus a chance, that you might have some moments of mental clarity. However after a long run things can be a little tricky if you have gone a bit too far and taken a bit too much out of yourself you might end feeling hazy. Post run recovery then becomes important for both body and mind.

The first thing I always do (apart from taking off the trainers, towelling away some of the sweat and swapping my t shirt for a fleece) is to get some food. I have read that eating within an hour of exercise is important for replenishing your glycogen and improving recover but that eating sooner is better. (There is a good brief summary about post run eating here and an article here that quotes Troy Flanagan, head of sports science for the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association: "When our athletes reach the finish line, they're trained to go right to the feed bag. They can take sports drink, a milk, or yoghurt drink, the feed bag is right on the hill. They will eat straight away."). My usually choice is a bowl of nutty muesli with a chopped up banana and a big mug of tea. Never does tea taste quite so delicious as it does after a run.

I like to consume this meal (more accurately my second breakfast) quite slowly and deliberately – relaxing. Music is important. I am not too bothered about listening to music when I run, sometimes I do, mostly I don’t, but after the run it helps set the mood. There are a number of albums that sound particularly post-run (almost anything from the ECM label works). They have to be slightly contemplative and have holes to give your mind scope to wander. This week I listened to The Blue Nile and thought about productivity as they are a group who have managed to produce a grand total of four albums in a career stretching back to 1984. Perfect music for a slow runner I thought.

After that it is time for a tepid shower. The thing I resist is having a warm bath – although it is tempting, after exercise I know they make me feel very dopey. After that I will make a decision about stretching. If my legs feel too beat-up I will not stretch, as I have an intuition (as far as I know it is not supported by any research) that if the muscle fibres are too frayed stretching might do more harm than good. Stretching can always been done later in a separate session.

Anyway that is what I tend to do after a run. I am sure all of us do things slightly differently as, like everything in running, it is a matter of experimenting until we find something that works. I am sure I will try other things in future - I might even try mince pies.