How to Visualize Running Your Best Race
Photos by Marques Jackson Photography.
By Marnie Kunz,
Certified run coach and personal trainer
Learning to visualize running success can help you improve your race times and become a stronger runner. Mental training is what separates the good from the great runners. Legendary athletes such as Allyson Felix, Billie Jean King, Michael Jordan, and Muhammad Ali all used visualization to deliver game-changing performances that forever changed the sports world. You can use the power of visualization as well to gain an edge over the competition and improve your running and defeat negative thoughts on the run. Whether you want to get faster for your next marathon, run your first 5K, or learn to relax and enjoy your runs more, these six steps to visualize running success will help give you the mental preparation you need to step up your mental game.
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What Is Running Visualization?
Visualization is the formation of a mental image of something. For sports, visualization is used to train the mind to reach higher levels of performance. According to the Association for Applied Sport Psychology, visualization - also called imagery - uses all of your senses (e.g., see, feel, hear, taste, smell) to rehearse your sport - in this case, running - in your mind.
Professional athletes regularly use visualization to help them get “in the zone” in games and races. In her book “Let Your Mind Run: A Memoir of Thinking My Way to Victory,” Olympian Deena Kastor describes how learning to train her mind and visualize helped her leap from being a great runner to an elite, pro athlete.
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Running visualization is not just a tool for the pros, however — it can also help you learn to relax and enjoy your races and workouts more while running faster times. Visualization is a mental training exercise that prepares your mind for great race performances by creating imagery to guide your mind to strong running performances. Mental imagery is so powerful that it can quell your nerves and help you achieve your big running goals in your mind's eye before physically accomplishing the feats.
One of my favorite books that helped transform my running is “Magical Running: A Unique Path to Running Fulfillment,” which has detailed visualization exercises for runners by an Olympic running coach.
Benefits of Running Visualization
Visualization has many benefits for runners. If you practice visualizing regularly, it can help reduce performance anxiety and stress while improving your focus and boosting confidence.
When you visualize running success, you also are clarifying your running goals and setting your intentions to make them happen. When your mind plays out the scenes of a great running performance, your body does not physically know the difference if you are actually performing or not, so visualizing is a very powerful tool to map out success in your mind.
When your race day comes, your body just replays the reel of your visualization with your mind as the guide.
Here are some of the benefits of visualization for runners:
Improves your focus
Calms performance anxiety
Improves your running performance
Helps you enjoy your running more
How to Visualize Running Success
You can employ the powerful tool of running visualization by setting aside just 20 minutes twice a week to practice. Here are 6 steps to visualize running success that will help you run faster and stronger, and enter “the zone.”
1. Lie down in a quiet place. Take a deep breath in, counting to 5. Hold for 5 seconds then exhale for 6 seconds. Repeat for a total of 10 deep breaths.
2. As you breathe, imagine your body filling with sand. You feel the tension release from your body as your limbs and torso sink into the earth.
Visualization can help you conquer your biggest running challenges.
3. Picture yourself preparing for a run or your next race. Use all of your senses to notice how you feel and what sights, sounds, and smells surround you as you warm up. Notice how confident you feel, employing mantras for strength.
4. Visualize your run. Use all five senses – sight, sound, taste, smell, and touch – to immerse yourself in the experience of race day. Notice the trees, buildings, people, and sounds around you. Feel your muscles working as your feet glide across the ground. Pay attention to how strong you feel as you enter the zone. Picture your run in as many details as possible, focusing on how you rise to meet challenges and feel strong and relaxed throughout the run. Employ your mantras to help you stay positive and focused as the race unfolds.
Visualization will help you to conquer your biggest race challenges, as well as enable you to enjoy the experience more.
5. Visualize finishing strong. Instead of focusing on a particular number or time, picture yourself running fast and strong. Your body and mind unite to propel you faster and faster toward the finish. Imagine a rope pulling you forward to the finish line. You are unstoppable. Hear the crowd cheering and feel the sweat on your body and face as you finish strong and happy. You gave the race your all and are grateful for the experience.
6. Return to consciousness. Count backward from 10, taking deep breaths. Slowly become more aware of your surroundings with each breath. Open your eyes as you reach the count of one.
Repeat this visualization exercise twice a week leading up to a big race. For the week of the race, practice using these running visualization techniques daily. The more you practice, the stronger your mind will become. Then when race day comes, your body will simply execute what your mind has already done.
Have you tried visualization for running? Follow and tag @Runstreet on Instagram to share your training and get cheered on. If you need a training plan to help you crush your next race, visit the Runstreet Training Center.
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Marnie Kunz is a NASM-certified trainer and USATF- and RRCA-certified running coach and the creator of Runstreet Art Runs, which bring together communities through running and street art. She is a Brooklyn resident, Akita mom, and writer.
