Post Race Funk and Marathon Training

11/21/25

I ran the Berkeley half marathon on Sunday. I PR’d at 2:11:12 but I also wrecked my left leg. I had a case of post race funk, and I’m slowly coming back to life.

I’ll start from the beginning. Earlier this year, I signed up for a half marathon. Then I signed up for 4 more. Here are stats:

February 2nd 2025, San Francisco 02:24:02
March 2nd 2025, Livermore 2:22:35
April 27th 2025, Brooklyn 2:27:13
June 1st 2025, San Jose 2:21:21
November 16th 2025, Berkeley 2:11:12

Berkeley was a last-minute B-race, which means that it was done during training for my A-race, which is a full marathon.

Before all my previous halves, I wanted to throw up the night before. But things were different for this one. I had been training for 8 weeks with Runna leading up to it, running 4-5 times a week with long runs on Saturdays, fueling with gels and electrolytes and getting in tune with my body. So I was confident that I’d finish.

The morning of, I had beet juice, electrolytes, toast with peanut butter, banana and honey, and drove to Berkeley. It was freezing but I didn’t dissociate like I did in Brooklyn. When the race started, I went deliberately slow for the first 2 miles before naturally picking it up. I’m pretty happy with my pacing strategy.

All was good until mile 11. Notice how it’s the fastest mile. I was feeling good and decided that I could go faster by driving my knees higher and creating a wheel-like motion with my legs. This was a bad idea, because I’m not used to the form and it created a heavier slam on the ground. Around mile 12, my IT band flared up and my left knee was over it. It was raining on course and Berkeley’s streets are uneven, so I twisted my left ankle too.

Surprisingly, the adrenaline quickly hid any ankle pain so I kept going and finished the race. I limped back to my car and couldn’t bend my knee for the rest of the day. I also didn’t fuel immediately afterwards which contributed to a major mood crash.

The Post Race Funk

The days after the race, particularly Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, my motivation and will to carry on reached a 2/10 on all fronts - physical, mental and emotional. I couldn’t run because of my ankle and IT band and didn’t want to risk aggravating the injuries, so all I could do was limp around the house wearing a bandage on my left foot. I was sleeping way more than usual. Any attempt to open my laptop and focus was unsuccessful due to brain fog.

I had no idea why this was happening. I did some research and it turns out, the post race funk is well documented. In the weeks leading up to a race, a runner is fully devoted to training. When the race is over, purpose, structure and daily highs vanish, so you’re left with a void.

But this wasn’t even my main event! Regardless, I put a ton of physical and mental energy into the race, and getting injured took me out of running for a few days, so I felt very out of rhythm.

The good thing is that I listened to a podcast that said the funkier the funk, the better, since it means you pushed and you’ll come out of it that much stronger. It just means your body did something hard, is going to adapt and you’ll improve. That was a much-needed viewpoint.

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were excruciating because I didn’t run at all. You’d think one would enjoy 3 days of rest but I hated it. On Thursday, I ran a successful test mile on the treadmill. So on Friday morning I did an easy 3 miles outside and was able to finish without any injury aggravation. I said thank you to someone in the sky after I was done. To stay on the safer side, I shortened the long run planned for Saturday.

Marathon Training

I’ve been using Runna to train and it has been the best. It varies the workouts, syncs with Strava, gives mile markers when running and post-run feedback. But most importantly, it removes all decision fatigue when it comes to training.

I’m learning about proper fueling before, during and after a run. I am obsessed with gels and electrolytes. I now know what a carb load is. I also realized I run best to qawallis and sufi music. I tried listening to short hype songs during runs, but I can never get in the zone with them. Sufi music is longer, has a slow buildup and repetition, which has worked well for me.

I hope to get back in the zone next week. Other exciting things coming up.