6 Ways I Stay Consistent for Comrades Marathon Preparation When Life Is Too Full

Training for the Comrades Marathon is hard, but training when life is already full is even harder. In this episode, I share six practical ways I stay consistent while juggling work, family, church, and fatigue. No perfect weeks, no guilt, no overcompensation - just real-life strategies that actually work. If your training keeps colliding with real life, this episode is for you.

Transcript

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Every day, you face a choice to stay where you are or to step boldly into the stronger, healthier, and more resilient version of yourself. Welcome to Move and Thrive, the podcast for active people who want to move better, train smarter, and stay healthy for life without burnout and without avoidable injuries. I am Dr. Siabo Magunene, your sports physiotherapist, coach, and partner on this journey towards a thriving and high-performing life. So I invite you to move, to grow and thrive. Welcome back, friends and fellow athletes. I hope you are enjoying the journey of staying active. It is great to have you again in this platform, and thank you so much for supporting the podcast. Today I want to speak to you not just as an expert, but as a friend and a fellow athlete in the trenches. Someone deep in marathon preparation, trying to train while juggling real life. I wanna have an open conversation with you. I wanna be honest. Comrades marathon training is hard. It's tough. Especially the preparation. For some reason, this year, training is not happening the way I would have loved to see it happen. Life feels full. Actually, sometimes life feels too full. I've been tempted many times to skip comrades this year, just take a break, but I find myself motivated to carry on. At some point, you even question the running itself to say, why do I run? You feel like you need you can just find something else to do. And I ask myself, Am I the only one who feels overwhelmed? As a result, my training is suffering. Maybe you are that person today. Maybe this episode is for you. I want to share my experience, my struggles. I want to share some tips on what is helping me manage with this training load. The reality is training does not happen in isolation, especially for us who are not just athletes, we are many other things. We are not professionals, there are people who just do running. That's all they do as a career. So some of us, training happens when we are doing full-time jobs. Training happens when we are showing up for our families, which they are a priority. We cannot compromise on that. Training happens while we are trying to serve the church, serve the community. And training also happens while we are managing fatigue. We get tired mentally, physically, and spiritually. But training must still happen. And sometimes training must happen when we simply don't want to train. So today I want to talk about what consistency and motivation really looks like. Not in theory, not in motivational codes, but in real life. When I started my comrades preparation this year, I had a clear plan. As always. Structured weeks, specific kilometers to do per week or mileage per week, quality sessions planned. On paper, it looked perfect when I started. But reality is humbling me. Quietly so. There are days when work runs longer than expected. I get home mentally drained. Family responsibilities take priority. As I mentioned, we cannot compromise on that. I I would rather leave everything else. There's church, there's community work, and there's many other things. And suddenly that perfect training plan that you have and the goals that you have no longer fits because of many other things that you do. So this season of training has taught me something important because I've learned lessons as I went through all of this. This training season has taught me this. Consistency is not about executing the plan perfectly, it's about adapting the plan without losing momentum. Sometimes we miss it. We want to be perfect. It's impossible to be perfect when you are an athlete. What is important is to learn to adapt the plan. The plan should guide the process of training. You must just adapt it, but just make sure you don't lose momentum. So it's important to be honest. There is an ideal situation or an ideal plan, but also there is real life. And learning the difference is part of the journey. So it's important to understand there is ideal and there is reality. And understanding the difference between the two will help you a lot. That's what I've learned in this process. Now let me be quick to share my struggles, especially with consistency and motivation. Then later I'm gonna give you some tips. I want to be honest about challenges I'm facing, particularly in preparation for Comrades Marathon. It may be possible that you are facing these same struggles as well. The first one is time pressure. Time pressure is real. There are days I plan proper quality sessions and it just doesn't happen. Not because I'm lazy, but because life demands something else. And in these moments, the temptation whispers. Just skip today, start fresh tomorrow. But I'm realizing something that skipped days have a way of adding up quickly. And you get to the point where you've compromised fitness and you've compromised the plan. So my first struggle is time pressure. It's real for me. I don't know about you. The next struggle I want to talk about is mental fatigue. This one is serious. Sometimes mental fatigue hits me hard. After a full day of work and responsibilities, the hardest part is not physical, but it's mental. You know you must go run. You know you must go to the gym and do some strength training, but every time you want to do it, something says to you, not today. So there are days like that. There are days where you are just not motivated. This is where consistency is truly challenged, is truly tested. So mental fatigue is real, especially when you are involved in a hectic training program like the one we are on now, which is the Comrades Marathon training program. Especially around March, April, May, those three months are very hectic. So you you experience mental fatigue, and that can be a big struggle. The third one, the sameness of training. I struggle with this. As I said, I've done Comrades Marathon four times, and it's my fifth one. And I'm the person who generally does not like doing the same thing over and over. So sameness is my serious challenge. At some point, training starts to feel repetitive. Same roots, same paces, same effort. Yes, we are improving there and there, but it just feels the same. So sameness of training can be a real issue and can be an issue of making you not motivated to continue do what you need to do. And if I'm honest, some days are just boring. I must just say that. Some days are just not exciting, not inspiring. Especially if you are doing it by yourself, no partners, no club. Because you may be living in an area where it's not easy to come together with people. Maybe on weekends you find you mingle with others, but sometimes it's just boring doing it by yourself. So sameness for me is a big one. You just feel like you want to do something else. That's why I do run and cycling. Even with doing all of that, you want to do other things because you get to a point where you are just doing the same thing all over and over. Another struggle for me is guilt trap. Missing a session for me, it's it's something serious. Missing a session can can easily lead to guilt. And guilt often pushes you to trying to catch up, trying too much, sometimes too soon. And as a physiotherapist, as a professional, I know exactly where that road leads. It leads to injury, it leads to burnout. So the issue of guilt trap is a problem. But let me be quick now. Let me not dwell on struggles and challenges. You have your own struggles and challenges. Let me be quick to share what is actually helping me. Stay consistent and motivated. Because I like to believe I am consistent. I may not be 100%, maybe 70, 80% compliant to a program, consistent in a way. I am a bit motivated still. So I want to share what is actually helping me. Remember, I'm not talking theory here. These are things I'm actively trying to practice. Imperfectly so. The first tip I want to give you is this try and lower the standard a bit, especially on hard days where things are not coming together. Lower that standard. You have set it for yourself, no one pushed you to it. Lower your standard a bit. It will help you a lot. I've stopped asking this question. Can I complete this full session or this training plan for this week? When I have this and when I have that. Now I'm starting to ask myself this question. What can I realistically do today or this week? That's a helpful question to ask yourself. Sometimes you end up not doing anything because you are sticking to this standard, this perfect plan, and if it does not happen, then you don't do anything without realizing that you just need to lower the standard a bit. Especially when things are not going according to plan. Some days may just mean doing 30 minutes of easy run, very short runs or short rides. And this is what I've learned that small runs or small rides keep the habit alive. That's what you want. You want to keep the habit alive because once you stop and once you take long not doing the activities, it's difficult to start the habit again. So it's important to lower the standard, especially on those hard days. That's tip number one. Tip number two, focus on showing up, not showing off. We like showing off. This thing of posting, this thing of uploading on Strava, it's a problem. Focus on showing up, not showing off. Not every run needs to be, you know, impressive. What I've learned now is to do my easy runs, controlled runs, nothing special. Special on hard days. Yes, you keep those key sessions proper. Don't don't show off. Just focus on showing up. Especially preparing for comrades. Sometimes we do two hard sessions, you know, unnecessarily. So what I've learned is that all of these will add up. And this that's where real fitness is built, especially for endurance. So focus on showing up, not showing off. Tip number three adjusting without feeling like you have failed. You must learn to adjust without feeling like you have done something wrong or you have failed. If I miss a session now, I don't panic anymore as I used to. I told myself, this is my plan. I can adjust this whenever I want to adjust it without feeling like I've failed. I don't try to fix my weeks. If I've missed a week or I've missed some session, I don't I don't overcompensate. I simply stick to the plan. If this week's plan says I must do this, I follow that. I don't try to catch up. In that way, there's no drama, no guilt. So that mindset protects consistency and it keeps you motivated. So learn to adjust without feeling like you have failed. That's tip number three. Tip number four, build around your life, not against your life. Build around your life, not against your life. There are other important aspects of your life that must still carry on. So build around. Instead of forcing training, you know, into unrealistic slots, I've learned to work with my schedule. Sometimes I do morning runs. When it does not happen, I do evening runs. Sometimes I do short runs on busy days. Yes, you may have a plan of one and a half hours of training, but 30 minutes can do on busy days. I'm now carefully planning my long runs on weekends. If they don't happen, I feature a long run on a Thursday or something. It's not perfect, but it is sustainable. Building around your life, not against your life. Because if you build against your life, many other things will fall apart. Tip number five accepting that not every run will feel good. Sometimes you want every run to be perfect. You want to feel good every time you run. Accept that not every run will or a ride will feel good. Some runs will feel lazy, some runs will feel heavy and hard. So not every run will feel amazing. But I'm learning that consistency is built when you show up, even when it doesn't feel great. So keep showing up. Don't worry much about how each run feels like. So accept that not every run will feel good. That's tip number five. The last one, there are many other tips I can give you, but I want to share the last one. Breaking the sameness. I want to come back to the issue of sameness. There is always a way of breaking sameness. By the way, sameness doesn't equal consistency. It's not the same as being consistent. Sameness can be a problem. Doing one and the same thing can be something that you know affects your motivation. When training starts to feel stale, this is what I do. I change small things, not big things. When you feel like it's getting stale now, just change a few things. You'll see things will start to be fun again. I explore new routes. Doing the same routes every now and then, that's what makes me frustrated. So I've learned to explore new routes. Sometimes I drive to a place and I run there. So there you are dealing with the issue of sameness. I incorporate treadmill sessions. I never used to like running on treadmill. I thought it was boring. But now I have decided to watch something while I run on treadmill. Listen to my favorite podcast while I run on treadmill. It helps. Swapping between mornings and evening sessions also help. Vary, alter your sessions. Running or cycling with a friend when possible, that's another way of spicing it up. You don't have to be doing big changes to break the issue of sameness. Just enough to stay engaged. Change small things just enough to stay engaged. So breaking sameness is possible. So these are some of the tips I can give you to remain consistent and motivated. If there's one lesson comrades training is teaching me this year, is this you don't need perfect weeks. You need consistent weeks. Aim to be consistent, not aim, don't aim to be perfect. We may fail with that. The goal is not to win every session, hit every kilometer perfectly. The goal is to keep showing up, stay healthy, build steadily, and balance life. Prioritize what is important in your life while you are training at the same time. This is what I'm learning. Because on race days, your body reflects what you have done repeatedly, not what you have done occasionally. You may be training hard occasionally, but that won't help you. The body will reflect on what you've done repeatedly. So if you are consistent, you're trying to show up every day, may not be aiming to be perfect. That's what will count. So if you are listening to this and struggling with consistency, struggling with motivation, know this. This is not a problem only you are experiencing. We all go through this. You are not alone in this struggle. We are all trying to balance training, life, responsibilities. And here is something I'm personally holding on to. Sometimes consistency is not about how strong you are, it's about faith. Faith that the small efforts you give today still matters. Believe in what you do today, no matter how small it is. I'm also believing that showing up even imperfectly is not wasted. Just know that. So do not grow weary because in time we reap what we have consistently sown. So keep showing up, adjust when needed, trust the process. The key is not perfection, it is persistence. It is consistency. And consistency always wins. Thank you for joining us again on Move and Thrive. If this episode supported you in any way, do pass it forward and inspire someone else.