Running your own race

I trail run.

I love it - being out on the trails in the forest, climbing up to a mountain peak, running across pastures. Even when it hurts, I love it.

Quite early on in my trail running I started doing competitions. In fact it was the first competition that really got me hooked on it.

Twenty kilometres starting at 1800m, rising to 2515m and then descending - with a few smaller ascents and a really mean little last kicker to horrify the uninitiated.

I undoubtedly used some bad language under my breath during that part! I swore I was never doing to do such a ridiculous thing again.

At the finish line I was utterly ruined and fell gratefully into a jaccuzi in all my clothes, along with numerous other sweaty finishers (no Covid 19 in 2018!).

Within half an hour I'd declared I was definitely going to race again next year. What a buzz!

Focus

What I’ve learnt over the past however many races and all my training sessions is that my progress and my performance is all about ME.  While I might take some inspiration from other runners, I have to focus on the race or the run being my run, run my way, using my best skills at the right moments in the race.

I start slow. I don’t do a few warmup kilometres like some runners do - I might run back and forth a little, do a bit of stretching, but I like to just start running when the race starts. That’s what works for me.  It means I’m often overtaken by quite a lot of people in the first few kilometres and I have to remind myself that that’s okay - because I’m going to catch a lot of those folks later on!

Find your strengths

In that first race I found I was great at running down hill. It hadn’t crossed my mind that you could be good or bad at it, to be honest, but it was clear I was pretty good and I overtook lots of people. The ascents... not so much! I was overtaken by scores of people on the ascents - then overtook many of them again on the next descent. It’s not such a bad way to meet people!

After that race I focussed a lot on my uphill training.

I ran the same race in 2019 and came second in my category. The friend I entered with came in just in front of me -.lesson learnt that year was to be more pushy. I was held up on a long stretch of flattish single track by another woman who was running just a little slower than I wanted to. I should have tapped her on the shoulder and got past - she probably had headphones in and didn’t even know I was there. Again - run your own race, not someone else’s.

Training pays off

Having focussed on my ascent training, last season I found I was overtaking people on some pretty steep climbs once the race was well underway. I still felt strong when others were starting to feel weak. Just realising what was happening empowered me and motivated me to keep going, to do well.  To do better.

 Those runners might have overtaken me at the start, but ultimately I had the endurance and the training to beat them.

It’s not who’s at the front at 5km, it’s who’s doing well at fifteen kilometres, at twenty and thirty kilometres. 

Being overtaken used to phase me and make me try to run faster. Which made me out of breath and gave me stitches, which made me need slow down… Now I remind myself that it’s okay to be overtaken early in the race, I know what I’m doing, I have a plan. 

Keeping spirits up

When I have a psychological dip during a trail race, which I invariably do, I have to dig deep and reassure myself that my eye is on the ball, that if I let myself get disheartened there might be another woman in my category not so far behind who’ll catch me up and steal my place. I think of running through the finish line and someone shouting ‘First Woman’. That hasn’t happened yet, but the thought keeps me going!

I have a mantra during the times I’m feeling weary too, a little nag for myself, I say “Come on Naomi, if you’re going to bother lifting your legs - make it count!"

What does this have to do with voice over?

Every profession is competitive, like a trail running race. I’m not the only middle-aged British female voice over out there with a native RP accent! To be successful and to be good I have to figure out my strengths and play to them, acknowledge my weaknesses and train to improve. And I have to pass anyone who’s going slower than me!

That’s the starting point of a plan. And at the heart of that plan is doing what I’m good at so I can serve my clients well.

I’m useless at sprinting. It took me until quite a long way through my life to discover I might be any kind of a runner at all, because I’d only ever run short distances, over which I’m rubbish!

There are some ares of voice over that aren’t the best fit for me. I could give it a shot but I wouldn’t be very good. That would make for a frustrating career and, if I got any, very likely some disappointed clients.

My voice over goal

I have a background in business as well as acting. Having worked as a consultant in fields including IT, finance and banking, insurance, digital television and healthcare, I’ve been around a lot of jargon and a lot of business vocabulary. So corporate voice over is a pretty natural fit. I find medical voice over a juicy challenge too - a bit like a steep hill. Sometimes frustrating when you’re on it, but incredibly satisfying at the top!

I’m not limited to corporate and medical voice over - I love a bit of character, storytelling and drama too - but these genres are my current focus. I can run flat races and cross-country, but right now trail running is what I do. By focussing on a narrower field I know I can deliver the standard of voice over that my corporate and medical clients deserve.