When the Road Disappears Under Your Feet
Here’s how you become a better, stronger, smarter runner today and start overcoming setbacks in running — by knowing the difference between a bad run and a real setback, and knowing what to do the next morning.
You’re mid-race. Everything is going to plan. Splits on target, breathing steady. And then — in one step — it isn’t. Not a bad patch. Something falls apart that you didn’t see coming.
This post is about real setback. Not the motivational-poster version. The kind that leaves you sitting on a kerb wondering what just happened.
The day the plan fell apart
Years ago I took a job as Vice President ASEAN for a so-called startup in Singapore. Office on Orchard Road. Glass, steel, glossy brochures, the logo everywhere. I was so keen to build something new that I skipped every check I would have insisted on for anyone else. I did not look at the cash flow. I did not test the business plan.
Within weeks the picture changed. The product did not exist in the form I had been promised. The funding wasn’t there. My salary did not arrive. Then a conference call, a faceless voice, and it was over. My work visa was cancelled with a stamp and a signature. I had a short grace period to leave the country and almost no money for a ticket.
That is not a bad run. That is the road disappearing under your feet.
Bad run or true setback?
Runners mix these two up all the time, and it costs them. Here is a simple way to tell them apart:
- A bad run is temporary and physical. Heavy legs, poor sleep, heat, a missed gel. Tomorrow will likely be better on its own.
- A true setback changes the plan. An injury, a DNF in your goal race, a life event that takes your training time away. Tomorrow will not fix it by itself — it needs a decision.
The mistake is treating a bad run like a disaster, or treating a real setback like a bad run. The first makes you quit too early. The second makes you push on when you should stop and rethink.
Ask yourself honestly: Will one good night’s sleep fix this? If yes — it’s a bad run. Let it go. If no — it’s a setback. Treat it with respect.
Falling is not failing: overcoming setbacks in running
“For though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again.”
— Proverbs 24:16
Read that slowly. It does not say the righteous don’t fall. It assumes they will — seven times. The difference is not in the falling. It is in the getting up.
In Singapore I had made a real mistake. Not a small misjudgement I could explain away. A clear, open-eyed error, because I wanted the offer to be true more than I wanted to know if it was. Once I admitted that, the question changed. It was no longer how did I get here? It became: what kind of man do I want to be on the way out?
That is the runner’s question too. Not “why did my calf go at kilometre 30?” but “what do I do now?”
What I actually did
Three things, and none of them were clever.
- I told the truth. I walked into a travel agent on a Friday afternoon and told a Singaporean lady the whole story, unedited. She said, “No can do lah.” Then she listened, worked the phones for an hour, and found a middle seat through Frankfurt on frequent-flyer miles. “Can can lah.”
- I called home. I said to my wife: “Sorry. I messed up.” After a pause she said, “Yes. Just come.” Some of the most important words I have ever heard.
- I went for a run. Out the door at six, an hour of road, and back. Not running away — running. By the third kilometre the problem had changed shape. By the sixth it was smaller. By the time I got home it had stopped being a problem and become a decision.
The next morning
When everything feels stopped, you don’t need a new plan. You need a first step. Here’s the morning-after routine I give runners who have just been knocked sideways:
- Get up at your normal time. Don’t let the setback steal your structure.
- Move for 20 minutes. Walk if you can’t run. Walk-and-talk: say out loud what happened, as if telling a friend.
- Write one sentence: “What happened was ___. What I control now is ___.”
- Make one small decision today. Book the physio. Choose the next race. Send the message you’ve been avoiding.
That’s it. Feedback, not identity. The setback happened to you. It is not who you are.
Build the comeback into days
A setback breaks momentum. The fastest way to rebuild momentum is a daily promise you can actually keep. That’s the idea behind Brain Training for Runners’ — a streak of at least 5K every day. If you’re in a real setback right now, don’t start at 5K. Start with a daily 20-minute walk and count the days. When the body is ready, the streak becomes a run streak. The counting is the medicine.
And once you’re healthy again, think about building a second sport for the next time life closes the road. My new book From Runner to Efficient Swimmer shows runners how to turn their fitness into a calm, efficient front crawl.
In Try Again, Singapore is one of the chapters I’m least proud of and most grateful for. It taught me that you can walk into the unknown, get it badly wrong, and still walk out with your dignity.
Your action step
Tomorrow morning, go for a walk-and-talk. Twenty minutes. Answer this out loud:
Is what I’m carrying a bad run or a real setback — and what is the one decision I can make today?
Take it easy, and God bless.
— Heiko