28 Emotions Only Runners Can Understand – Runner’s World
28 Emotions Only Runners Can Understand Runner’s World
Running is physically challenging, sure, but it’s also an emotional gauntlet. Every training session makes you really feel your feelings. And those emotions often go way beyond your regulation glad, sad, or mad.
New York Magazine recently reported on “a scientific theory that suggests we have infinite emotions, so long as we can name them.” Inspired, we created a new dictionary of 28 highly relatable running-specific emotions. Feel free to drop this new modern lexicon of feels the next time you lace up.
contoentment
The strange sense of pride when you lose a toenail while training for a race.
Quickhoney
runnui
The feeling, occurring way too soon into some long runs, that you have always been running, and will always be running, and are physically incapable of moving at any pace but this exact one. You can’t stop and there’s nothing you can do but endure it, because there’s no hope it’ll feel better.
oh no-tivation
The motivational effect of running too close to an unsettling natural element, like a Ford-Fiesta-sized elk or a flock of geese. Oh god, are they getting closer? Let’s kick this pace up a few notches.
Getty Images with Illustration by Quickhoney
brainlaxing
The exact moment, typically occurring somewhere between miles 1 and 3, when your brain shifts away from obsessing and worrying and finally loosens into that sweet, running-induced thoughtlessness.
KEVIN!
When you suddenly realize mid-run that you forgot something important, like your inhaler, and you scream internally like Catherine O’Hara in Home Alone.
Quickhoney
smuglapping
The self-congratulatory, joyous feeling of passing someone on the trail, no matter how low-hanging the fruit. Yeah, you just showed that 11-year-old on training wheels who’s boss. Eat it sucker!
downhillception
You glance at your running watch and notice your pace has substantially quickened. You get excited: You’re flying, and it’s not even that hard! But as a cyclist breezes by you without even pedaling, you realize that you are not reaching some new level of skill and power, you’re just going downhill.
foamgasm
The OMG nothing-has-ever-felt-this-soft-and-supportive bliss felt when slipping into a new pair of sneakers.
Getty Images with illustration by Quickhoney
near-diva experience
When you get so amped up by the music in your earbuds that you subconsciously open your mouth to sing along, but stop yourself in the nick of time.
crotch panic
The sudden realization that your undermost layer has become completely, uncomfortably misaligned, but there’s nowhere to tastefully adjust it for miles.
Quickhoney
gelticipation
The excitement of knowing that in a mile you get to eat your fuel gel.
racestalgia
Yearning for a specific past race, where conditions were perfect and your body felt great. Sigh. Virginia Beach 5K 2017, I miss you.
Stravannoyed
When you crush a long run, whip out your phone and open your tracker app, only to realize the GPS never synced and all the data is wrong.
Stravaspondent
When you crush a long run, whip out your phone and open your tracker app, only to realize you forgot to press “start.”
trash can time
When you’re about 70 percent through your training schedule, feeling grouchy and tired all the time, and considering temporarily relocating to a residence that better suits your disposition in order to spare your loved ones.
Quickhoney
vertigoing uphill
When an upcoming hill stretches to 3 times its actual length and steepness in your mind’s eye, a la Looney Tunes.
u-turnphoria
When you’re halfway through your distance and get to turn around.
Pavlov’s pleasure
This feeling is brought on by those little things that give you a boost on a molecular level, like the mile-complete twinkling from your watch, or the landmark you always pass when you’re almost home. Not unlike Fido, you’ve been trained to react this way.
shower shock
When you step into the shower after a long run and realize just how badly you’ve chafed.
Quickhoney
raPRture
The elation that follows after you crack a very tough-to-achieve personal record.
gearitation
Charging up the watch, digging up clean socks, fitting your too-big gel packets into the too-small pocket of your fanny pack—it’s when the whole process of gearing up for a run makes you irritated beyond belief.
caterpillaring
When you’re exerting what feels like your normal effort, but somehow, your body is moving slower than you thought humanly possible.
Quickhoney
speedprise
The feeling of unexpected joy when your watch informs you that you ran that last mile much faster than you realized.
high-high low-lows
When, over the course of a race, you cycle through bouts of extreme overconfidence (this is so easy, I’m def going to PR, I’d like to thank the Academy) and extreme despair (why did I think I could do this, I’m tired, if I stop now I think I’m close to a bus stop).
squishmisery
When you step in a puddle during mile 2 of a 14-miler.
Getty Images with Illustration by Quickhoney
OOMO (obsessing over missing out)
When you’re sick, injured, or otherwise sitting out a beloved annual race, so you obsessively scroll through the race hashtag and intentionally induce extreme jealousy over all the medals and bagels and schwag. Aw what, they got hats this year?!
corrallercoaster
The emotional potpourri you experience while waiting in the corral for your race to start. Excitement, hopefulness, nervousness, the panicked urge to pee even though you just went—it’s all part of the corrallercoaster.
crowdphoria
Kids with nice signs, cute puppies along the route, fellow racers exchanging high-fives—this sweet stuff hits differently (and intensely) when you’re racing. No, I’m not crying, you’re crying!
Quickhoney