Lifting my hand to my brow around mile 7, I knew I was in trouble. I was a little over half way through the Star Valley Half Marathon race, and I had stopped sweating and was feeling lethargic. This was a clear sign that if I didn’t slow down and get some liquids, my safety would be at risk.

When I signed up for the race with a goal of finishing in under two hours, I was determined to not have to walk during any part of it; and I followed a training routine that had me well prepared to go the distance. Now it didn’t matter. I knew in my heart that I had to walk and work on refueling.

As I came up on the finish line, I spotted my wife, my mom and my kids cheering me on. It felt great to see them, but I was totally spent, which Kellie later attested to after seeing my colorless face. Crossing the finish line just after mile 13 at two hours and fifteen minutes, I headed to a shaded canopy, collapsed on the grass, and immediately fell asleep for a few glorious minutes while I waited for some cold water.

How did my well-laid plans lead to such an unexpectedly poor performance? After talking with others and working it through in my mind, two key areas stood out.

First, I was overdressed. I was in a cotton shirt and cotton shorts, which had usually been fine for my early morning runs at 5:30 or 6am in June, but this race started at 7am in the middle of July.

A related and more essential point was I became dehydrated. I needed to replenish fluids much more regularly to account for the heat, and I wasn’t drinking nearly enough. I ran into a fellow runner a few days ago and I asked him how he did. He told me he literally stopped running at every water station, fully refueling before continuing the race. He typically runs at a similar pace as me, and he crossed the finish line at a comfortable one hour and forty eight minutes–almost 30 minutes before I did.

As a financial planning company, we can’t let an experience like this pass without relating some financial lessons.

I think in many cases our financial lives don’t turn out the way we expected them to. If the end goal is a comfortable retirement, we may have pinned down some nest egg number to shoot for, and as retirement approaches, we see we’re coming up short.

Fortunately, working toward retirement isn’t a race of a couple of hours, it’s over decades, and even in your 50s or 60s you still have years to catch up financially.

Here are several possibilities to get yourself back on track of the retirement race:

Raise your savings rate to increase the size of your retirement portfolio. Small adjustments make a big difference, and dollars saved in your pre-retirement years can grow significantly over time.
Make sure your investments have enough risky assets, like stocks, to receive the growth your portfolio requires. Just because you’re coming up on retirement does not mean you should move all your investments to safety.
Consider a plan to delay Social Security as long as possible. This benefit increases substantially over time, and for those who expect to live a long life, delaying this benefit, while relying on something like part-time wages or starting a pension sooner, can make a lot of sense.
Make a plan to pay off as much debt before retirement as possible. As we explored in a recent article, a couple can live comfortably on a very modest retirement income if they don’t bring a mortgage and auto loans into retirement with them.
Consider part-time income or a retirement side hustle. Some of my happiest retired clients find ways to earn some extra money during retirement, such as through working at local shops, listing their home on an Airbnb while away on vacation, substitute teaching, or even starting a side business.

Working and saving toward retirement is a decades-long journey, and many retirees spend decades more in retirement. You may have made some tactical errors along the path, but today is a great day to make some adjustments. I promise–there is still time!

As for my half marathon flub, I haven’t let this setback get me down. With this new-found insight, I’ll be running the Star Valley Half Marathon next year! I’ll be the guy in short running shorts, a very lightweight non-cotton t-shirt, and either a half gallon water pack strapped to my back, or stopping at each aid station to fill my body with glorious H20!