You cross the finish line, take a breath, and almost immediately, a voice creeps in: I could have done better.
Maybe you went out too fast. Maybe your fueling was off. Maybe your training didn’t go as planned. It’s tempting to run a post-race debrief that turns into a blame game. We all do it. But let’s pause and ask—where does that mindset come from? And is it actually helping?
Psychologists call this counterfactual thinking. It’s what happens when we imagine different outcomes based on “what if” scenarios. It can sound like:
-
"If I hadn’t taken that walk break..."
-
"If I’d trained harder..."
-
"If the weather had been better..."
It’s totally human. But here’s the kicker: more often than not, it robs us of the ability to recognize what actually happened.
I first heard this idea framed in a powerful way by coach and author Matt Fitzgerald in How Bad Do You Want It? He said something that stopped me in my tracks: If you could have done better, you would have.
Not in theory. Not in an ideal world. But in the exact body, mind, and moment you were in that day.
That reframe matters. Because effort isn’t just about your fitness—it’s about perception, pain tolerance, focus, emotion, and fatigue. Every decision you made in a race was made from inside your lived reality. And that version of you did the best they could.
This isn’t about settling. It’s about honoring. Honoring your effort. Honoring your context. Honoring the fact that progress doesn’t always look like a PR.
It also means we stop shaming ourselves for results that don’t meet arbitrary expectations. Especially for runners in midlife, Masters athletes, or anyone navigating hormonal shifts, life stress, or health challenges—our bodies are not machines. The sooner we stop acting like they should be, the better we perform, mentally and physically.
What if we replaced “I could have done better” with:
-
"I did the best I could with what I had."
-
"I learned something I’ll use next time."
-
"That wasn’t my peak day, but it was still a win."
You are allowed to want more while still being proud of what you did. One doesn’t cancel the other out.
So the next time you hear that voice saying you could have done better, ask yourself: Could I have, really? Or is that just hindsight, trying to rewrite a race that already taught me something important?
Your effort is always valid. Even when it’s messy. Especially when it’s messy.
I’d love to hear how this lands with you. Have you caught yourself in that “what if” spiral after a race or hard workout? How do you talk yourself out of it—or through it?