Hey Runners

Are you fed up with doing everything “right”… only to have your body shut things down anyway?

I hit that wall this year.

Since mid-August, I’ve been dealing with an Achilles tendinopathy and it forced me to face something every runner who truly pushes themselves will eventually run into...

Injuries.

But you see, injuries aren’t a sign you’re doing it wrong.

They’re often the cost of finding your limits.

So today, I want to walk you through how I’m dealing with it and how you can handle injuries when they inevitably happen.

You see, when the Achilles first flared up, I did what most runners do.

I tried to outrun it.

I hoped it would disappear if I ignored it long enough.

It didn’t.

The turning point came when I stopped fighting the fact that I was injured and accepted it fully and removed almost all my training volume.

Not in a defeatist way...

But in a “this is reality, now what?” way.

The moment I did that, my energy shifted from frustration to problem-solving.

Instead of obsessing over what I couldn’t do, I focused on what I could improve.

Strength work that had been neglected.

VO₂ max sessions on the bike.

And surprisingly, areas outside of running too.

More time with family, more focus at work.

Things that normally get squeezed when training volume is high.

At my lowest point, I was running 7 km per week.

For context my normal volume is 70 km per week.

But I kept one rule: I didn’t stop being a runner.

Even on the worst weeks, I still got out the door.

Short, easy runs.

No ego.

No expectations.

Just the habit.

And that consistency (however small) made a massive difference mentally.

I never felt like I had to “start over.”

And somewhere during those long rehab weeks, I reminded myself of one thing..

Every great performance story we admire?

Every comeback we've ever respected?

None of them happened without setbacks.

In fact the opposite is true.

The greatest stories and the most epic heroes had to overcome the biggest challenges.

And that mental frame, that this will just be another epic story you'll one day tell your grandkids...

That makes all the difference.

So, if you’re dealing with an injury right now, here’s what I’d focus on:

• Accept what’s going on as early as possible and shift into solution mode.
• Keep some form of training alive, even if it looks laughably small.
• Let this phase add depth to your story instead of taking something away from it.

The bigger the dragon, the more epic the hero.

You got this,

Nicklas

PS. The Run Lab is opening at the end of of this month and I can't believe all the positive messages I've gotten from people excited for it. It's truly amazing. I'm only opening a few spots to make sure I can help everyone, so if you want to be first in line when the doors open you can sign up for the waitlist here: https://nicklasrossner.com/the-run-lab/​