0/ On #rebooting or starting again
Why is it so difficult to start again. A thread on #running, #startups and #founders.
Understanding founder mindset through road running.
1/ The difference between #stamina, #endurance and speed endurance
Stamina, the ability to perform a task at certain capacity, rate or pace.
Like running 5km in 30 minutes or 10km in 60.
Stamina is focused on maintaining a rate or pace for a certain duration or time
2/ Endurance is the maximum time you can sustain an activity without worrying about pace or rate.
Like going for a long slow run. Here distance or pace is not important. Maximizing time on road is.
Liking a 90 minute run. Focus on 90 minutes. Not distance or pace.
3/ Speed endurance is a training tool.
Coaches use it to build stamina. Repeats of shorter faster runs with short breaks to build up stamina for longer runs.
Like 5x1km repeats with 3 min rest in between, at faster than normal race pace.
Feels as if you are dying.
4/ What do you lose first when you stop training?
Endurance is the last to to go. Speed endurance is the first.
Most runners can start running after a break of 4 weeks. 8 weeks is the longest you can stay away before losing it all.
Re-building speed endurance is painful.
5/ We lose speed endurance within ten days.
You can build it back it up if its been a short break. Anything longer, you will have to start again from zero.
To get yourself back in shape, to run a sub-6 min/km 10k is not just painful, its going to take a long long time.
6/ How fast you can get back depends on how active you were during your break.
I put on an excess 5kgs during mine. Till that melts away, I can forget about speed or speed endurance.
If you want to keep speed endurance, you have to keep at it.
Use it or lose it.
7/ Like runners, founders often work in bursts of short intense effort.
Our skill set is specialized.
Ideation, discovery, customer development, growth, scale and a strong sense of self belief.
Like cycling, swimming and running it comes back to us when we restart.
8/ Like rebuilding speed endurance, it takes time to get a startup, an idea or a team up to speed again.
There is also excess baggage that has to be shed.
Without shedding the baggage, you can forget about speed, agility or nimbleness.
9/ Repetitive cycles of short intense failures are similar to speed endurance training.
Feels like you are dying. During and after.
But with training you get better at handling the pain.
You can handle it, but its still pain. Hurts like crazy.
10/ Whether running or starting up as a founder, you need to step up your game.
That step up is not possible without repeated failures and the pain that comes with it.
Because we know what is coming, we don't want to start on that path again.
Use it or lose it.
11/ I know I no longer have it in me to do another startup.
I have given all that I could give.
I can no longer handle the training curve. And I don't want what's waiting at the end of the rainbow.
But luckily, I haven't hit the same threshold with running.
12/ On #rebooting and starting up all over again. A thread on #founders #startups and #running.
@faizansiddiqi
@jehan_ara
@alinawab
@TalhaIzhar
@Huk06
@babushka99
13/ Context. A student asked last week if I would do it all over again, one more time.
I said no. He asked why. This thread is for him. You know who you are :)
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