September: Humility

   No one masters the marathon. No one conquers the mile. World records stand only to fall. And sooner or later your own personal best time will stubbornly refuse to be bested. These are the cruel stakes of competitive running, and any training program that fails to acknowledge them is doomed.

   Still, they shouldn't discourage you - quite the opposite. The uncertainty of outcome is racing's greatest appeal. Planned effort, determination, and buckets of sweat will get you to the starting line. But then you have to relinquish control. The drama that unfolds reveals essential truths about your abilities and about your character. You can't possibly know these until the starting gun pops. Best of all, every race is a new opportunity to find these truths.

   One secret to competitive running is to eliminate, as far as possible, the variables that would prevent you from performing at your best. This sounds obvious, but it works in subtle ways. You should anticipate specific challenges in the course, the weather, the size of the starting pack, and anything else that's going to affect your day. Likewise, racing too little or too much before your target event can undermine your efforts. Rehearsal races dispel jitters, help you establish pacing, and accustom you to packs of runners, drinking on the run, and other details that play a bigger role than you might imagine. But if you crowd your calendar with these events, your program loses focus. You steal training time from your ultimate goal.

   Another secret: freak out early. Elite runners plan their training schedules backward from race day. Many months before your target event you'll see the biggest gains in performance or endurance. You'll also see the staggering amount of work required to meet your goal - that is, if it's a good goal. This is the time to revise your training program or revise your race date. The longer you wait, the more likely you are to fail. Worse, the psychological setback from scotching a race three weeks prior brings up entirely different feelings of failure. Remember that every workout produces new information about your abilities. Act on it early.

   Once you've locked into a program that's producing results, however, don't second-guess yourself. By race date, the consistency of your progress will matter more than the fine-tuning of workouts or the sporadic conversion experiences you've had with odd drills or interval routines. And cramming certainly doesn't work; you only risk injury. If you feel that you're coming to an event less than ready, just remember that competition has the miraculous power to draw more from a runner than the runner knew was there.

   Finally, be prepared for two rough patches in your event - even if it's a sprint. It's psychologically easy to overcome the first. The second will test your character. No matter how much you prepare for competition, fate invariably throws up cruel ambushes. Be willing to collect yourself with dignity and dust off. This is a victory in its own right, even if your ultimate goal slips away. The opportunity to vindicate it waits for you at your next race.