You’re Not Slow. You’re Running With the Wrong Voice.

You’re Not Slow. You’re Running with the Wrong Voice.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re just not fast enough—like no matter how hard you train, you’re always falling behind where you want to be—you’re not alone. Most runners respond to that by doing the obvious:

They train harder. Add speed work. Build mileage. Incorporate strength training.

Throw more at the problem and hope something sticks.

And what do they get?

Sure, some progress. But those are small wins—marginal gains squeezed out of a body that’s already working hard. And still… not as fast as they could be.

So they tweak things. Change the plan. Add more. Subtract something else. Question everything. Second-guess the process.

And when the results don’t match the effort, they start to believe maybe this is just how it is for them.

They’re “slow.”

They’ll just have to be realistic. Pick easier races. Lower the bar.

But here’s the truth:

There’s way more speed left in your mind than your body.

You’re not running slow because your legs can’t handle it.

You’re running slow because of what’s happening in your head—especially when things get hard. When you watch others pull ahead. When the doubts creep in mid-race. When you’re deep into a long training day, and your brain starts to bail.

That voice—the one that says:

“I can’t do this.”

“I’m not going to make it.”

“It’s not worth it.”

“I should drop.”

That voice doesn’t just make you feel worse - it makes you slower.

It drains your energy right when you need it most.

It weakens your muscles. It affects your gut. It shortens your stride.

It makes the finish line feel farther away—because now, you’re dragging your doubt along with you.

It’s like running with a weighted vest you don’t even know you’re wearing.

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Try this: pick the biggest, most challenging hill on your route and start up it. Then partway up, think about something you’re ashamed of or harshly criticize yourself for. Picture it. Feel it.

How does that affect your energy?

I’ve got a particularly big hill on my daily run, and doing this used to bring me to a full stop. Years ago, when I started paying attention to the mind-body connection, I noticed and tested this. It happened every time.

Negative thoughts directly weaken your body.

They steal the energy you need to keep moving.

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The good news? You can get that energy back.

You can gain speed—not just by grinding harder, but by thinking differently.

You don’t have to settle for surviving races or scraping through long runs.

You can train your brain the same way you train your body: to respond with strength. To recover from a negative thought faster. To stay in it.

You learn to replace that quitting voice with the one that gets it done. The voice of your confident, finish-line self.

The one that doesn’t bail.

The one that says, “You’ve got this,”—and means it.

That kind of self-talk isn’t fluff.

It’s fuel.

And when you have it?

You don’t just finish more races—you finish faster. You stop relying on luck or hoping for a good day. You stop blaming your body.

You stop thinking grit is something everyone else has and you somehow don’t.

This is the first skill I teach inside coaching—how to find that strong voice and make it your default.

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Managing the thoughts you listen to is a skill. One that changes everything.

And it might be the only thing you’re missing.