Bullshit !

No it is not ! It is 100% always your choice to decide against it ! Of course you cannot out smart a grizzly bear running with 35 miles an hour max speed, hunting you down. I talk about cracking a meniscus, twisting an ankle, getting a stress fracture, a piriformis syndrome or chaffing a whole on the side of the knee while running with a tight ITB and so.

There are always signs and symptoms about problems getting out of control, way before they do so. Running hard while sick ? No news that you developed plantar fasciitis. Your body cannot handle the attack of bacteria and viruses against your immune system and the serious metabolic load of 15 by 400m interval set in the cold, in the same time. Something got to give ! Chaining together multiple weekends of hard 10 to 20km trail running races and maybe adding in a couple of ultra events, topping the year with over 20 or often over 30 performances ? Professional marathon runners compete in 1 or 2 hard events a year and add maybe 4 or 5 shorter tune up races. This is true of corse for guys being here for the long run ! There might be some super athletes getting in 20 plus a races a year and winning most of them, but they are in bed early, wake up with no alarm, worry not, sponsored and paid well, live a very healthy stress free lifestyle and train and race as much as they want how they want.

I twisted an ankle, because of a dislodged rock. If you could not focus and lacked attention to observe the terrain where you were putting your feet, you should have slept better, you should have eaten something else, you should have practiced more on that kind of terrain. It is your fault.
If you let your body broke down and ran with a bad running form the last 10km of a half marathon, then your knee hurts badly? It is your fault and you pay big time for your past decisions !
Olympians do so ! The thing is, that they first of all will recover better most likely, as after exceptional performances they can go ahead and have a rest week. You will be back in the office Monday, despite that you won the weekend local 10k. Then you’ll get a phone call about not showing up at the Tuesday track session. Thursday you are back at running starting out with mile repeats ! You don’t have access to pool running, anti-g treadmills and massage therapists.

I am ranting here, yes I know. I just don’t want to hear anymore about complaining. I don’t mind reading about injuries and healing. I however cannot stand the “there is something wrong with me” or “my body is not made for running” statements.
Mostly your mind is not made for running and compromising running form throughout 2-3-4 decades will pay it’s due ! It is actually better if it comes down to a couple of years, because nursing problems for longer and longer will result in one giant irreversible collapse !

I only had like 3 major injuries in a decade. An ITB and a Piriformis syndrome and one stress fracture of the fibula. The ITB was a 2 months procedure, becasue I had no knowledge about curing it with movement, mobility and homeopathy. Now I am done with it in like 3 days. My bad !
The piriformis syndrome was there for about 3months, but I never stopped running. I just tripled up my warm up time and foam rolled a lot.
The fibular stress fracture stopped me from running for 2 weeks. I walked in VFF 20 to 40km, 5 times a week, fasted. I had a very specific calcium intake of hydroxyapatite and glycerophosphate with all night “cataplasmes” from clay or comfrey. Done !

I just described something here, what you should see behind the words. I learnt from all of those ! Learnt a lot ! I am not getting into situations like that anymore. I work towards a stronger body and to not to compromise my health ! I might have to skip or abandon a race. But the next one, instead of pain, will be filled with joy and pleasure !

It is your decision !!! Always !!!