Saucony Blog » Inspiration

Marathon Life Lessons

Dorothy Beal — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 15:48:44 +0000

It was mile 11 of my 22^nd marathon and the sign ahead would get me through the next 15.2 miles. Everything you ever wanted to know about yourself you can learn during a marathon.Marathon 21 had been 13 days before. My heart was ready to run another 26.2 but my legs had another idea. The pain, much like my determination to finish, was more immense than the previous race. I needed to prove to myself that even though I have conquered the distance many times before, that I could do it again. It wasn’t a race for chasing PR’s – it was a race to emotionally prove to myself that I have the strength to live the life I dream of. Here are some of the things I learned over those remaining 15.2 miles:

Starting and finishing something is important in life. If you quit when the going gets tough it only gets easier to keep quitting.
It’s going to hurt - life hurts. There are lows and highs and the highs feel higher when you know what the lowest of lows feel like.
You will feel good for a period but no matter how much you want to bottle up that feeling, you can’t. Enjoy it while it lasts.
The marathon does not care what you look like. It does not judge you. Make friends in life who are like the marathon. Ones that accept you for who you are.
Find something that makes you happy-really, really happy. Running makes me happy.
The mind is a powerful tool. When your body hurts make your mind run your body–this is true in life and in running.
You have a choice whether or not to have a smile on your face–even when you are in pain. Happiness is a state of mind you choose, not a destination you are looking for.
I can do anything I put my mind to. Anything.
Do not fear the inevitable pain that may come. The only thing to truly fear is fear itself. Pain is something that one must go through at times, in order to grow, it isn’t always bad.
The simple things in life are some of the most enjoyable: wind blowing through your hair; the warm sun on your skin on a fall day; the beautiful colors of the leaves falling by the riverside; a stranger cheering you on.
The things that mean the most in life are often the hardest.
I am strong. VERY STRONG.

What has a marathon taught you about yourself?

Aftermath of the NYC Marathon

James O'Brien — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 22:35:30 +0000

It’s close to two weeks ago now that New York City and the tri-state area was being buffeted by what many have called the worst storm in the region’s history. The consequences and the clean-up have been unparalleled. Entire coastal areas of New York and New Jersey no longer exist. Public transportation came to an entire halt and is still not fully functional. More than half a million area residents remain without power, and this as New York City experienced its coldest days of the season. Thousands are homeless, living in shelters, pondering how to begin to get their lives back together. Many of those residents live on Staten Island, one of New York City’s celebrated five boroughs, in fact the one known around the globe as the starting point of arguably the most celebrated marathon in the world. When Mayor Bloomberg pronounced, in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, that the November 4^th ING New York City Marathon would proceed as planned, there were plenty, myself among them, who didn’t quite know how to handle that piece of news. On the one hand, maybe the Mayor had a point: at a time of unprecedented adversity, the Big Apple would bounce back, just as it had after 9/11. This, the race, with 45,000 runners hammering through the five boroughs, would be an uplifting, soul salving undertaking at a time when New York sorely needed it. The other school of thought asked if this event – a race, fundamentally a frivolous undertaking, and one calling for enormous City resources – was appropriate? New York had not been attacked. Nobody needed to be defied. Mother Nature had simply unleashed an unreasonable wrath and dozens had died, thousands were threatened with homelessness and hunger, power failures affected millions, and the restoration costs were incalculable. A marathon? Really? With all the ancillary elements that it demands – food, water, police, first responders - could it, should it, go on as planned? Mayor Bloomberg and the New York Road Runners remained adamant that the show would go on; but, even they must have been given pause. At the starting line in Staten Island’s Fort Wadsworth, the NYRR would distribute 93,600 bottles of water, 30,000 energy bars and smoothies and 45,000 cups of coffee. Simultaneously, just a few miles away – literally – in Staten Island’s Tottenville area, homes had been washed into the sea and families were desperately seeking food and shelter. One woman had her two children swept from her arms by flood-waters as she pulled them from her stalled automobile. They were found dead, days later, in a swamp. As this debate grew more heated in the days before the race, the two camps grew more divided. Everybody who was registered to run wanted to run – though some were scared of being harassed by spectators along the route. The general populace grew more and more opposed. Many were incensed. Interviewed by Matt Lauer on NBC’s The Today Show, even the NYRR’s CEO Mary Wittenberg could barely conceal her own qualms. Though she said all of the correct things in support of the Mayor and of the race, the stress of the public conflict was written across her face. When the final decision to cancel came down on the Friday afternoon before the Sunday event, the reason given was that the race had become a divisive entity rather than the unifying celebration that it was intended to be and always is. One writer in the Wall Street Journal observed that the way to fall in love with New York City is to run the marathon. He said a mouthful; I ran it for the first time in 1979 and have been living here, pretty much, ever since. The Mayor and the NYRR were correct: the race had become a polarizing, resented undertaking in a city that, right now, needed none of that. So, though it took a while, the decision of the Mayor and the NYRR to cancel this year’s marathon was the right one. There was one heck of a lot of disappointed people in and around Manhattan when the news broke; but here’s where things started to get interesting. If unity and inspiration and celebration and healing were necessary, this was when it all began. Just as quickly as disappointment struck so, too, did the realization that – WTF –all these people were going to run the marathon, anyway. Any runner knew that. There’s the inherent beauty in running and runners. You don’t need much – just a starting line, a bunch of crazies who won’t take “No” for an answer and somebody to yell “Go.” With that, you’ve got a race, if not a movement, that would make you fall in love with a broken city all over again. That’s what happened. On the subway on Sunday, race day, I encountered a German couple, from Bremen. “The atmosphere in Central Park is amazing,” they said. What any runner knew would happen, did. The race was cancelled, so they showed up anyway and ran on their own – on their own with 10,000 other people who had exactly the same idea. They ran loops in the Park, they got in each others’ way. They stopped for photos at the Marathon finish line by Tavern on the Green. And spectators stood at roadside and cheered them on, gave them water and, magically, turned what had been a deep bruise on the Big Apple back into what the Marathon properly represents – New York City and the wonderful sport of distance running at its finest. If this had been choreographed, it could not have been more beautifully done. Mayor Bloomberg and the NYRR responded to the vox populi and, intentionally or not, produced a little magic when it was sorely needed. If you don’t believe in magic, that’s only because you weren’t there. Runners: they do crazy things. We could use a lot more of them right now. Have some thoughts? Post them in the comments section below.

Do We Have Quality Running Talent in the U.S.?

Jack Daniels, PhD — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 21:59:15 +0000

Do we have the talent necessary to be among the best in distance running? I believe we do have the talent, but we are not identifying it, so our best runners never take up the sport of running. In a sense, we do very well with those in our country who decide to be runners, but a very small percentage of our youth ever consider being runners.

A major factor holding us back in producing more quality distance runners is the lack of Physical Education programs in our school systems. If all our youth were exposed to regular physical activity throughout their early school years, some would find that they can run well and may even enjoy doing it. Others would be spotted by qualified teachers, as potential runners. As it is now, many of our better runners started running in hopes of getting in shape for another sport, or often because they got cut from another sport, so decided to give running a try.

It really boils down to the fact that a very small percentage of distance runners in this country take up the sport because they want to be a runner, and when you don’t have many doing something because that is what they want to do, you end up with a few stars, but not many.

Learning to run is like learning to read or write; you need to practice to do it well and few of our youth practice running. Certainly very few get a shot at it in their early school years, with so few Physical Education classes offered, and when more free time is spent learning how to operate the latest electronic device than is spent on how to get a human body from point A to point B with ease. Encouraging good health and fitness must become a more important part of everyone’s life and in doing so we will find many more champions in lots of sports.

A great advantage that running has over many other sports is that to run doesn’t take nearly as much skill, as does swimming, for example. Sure, there are some aspects of running that can be worked on to make it a little less stressful, but most of our youth can run without being taught how. I guess I would have to say that the sport of running may be the simplest sport of all, so to be great at it just requires a little time spent doing it. We have the talent to compete with anyone, so let’s get after it.

Run The One You’re With

Dorothy Beal — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 15:53:25 +0000

It is not uncommon for new runners as well as veterans to fear the long run. Anxiety of whether or not one can finish the distance can remain whether it is the first time you are running long or the 100^th time. Long, being relative to the individual, may mean you worry about an 8 mile run or it may mean the mental stress is coming from those important 20 milers leading up to a marathon. In order to keep fear at bay and enjoy distances up to 20 miles and beyond I’ve started to run the one I’m with. What I mean by this is that I run the mile I am in and focus only on that mile. It scares my mind if I am on mile 2 of a 20 mile run and think about the 18 more I have to go. If I focus on finishing mile 2 strong and getting to mile 3 then I am working on manageable distances that my mind can wrap itself around. Often during long runs one can experience a multitude of emotions as well as a range of how the body feels. One mile you are cruising along thinking about how fit you are and 10 minutes later your legs feel like they are filled with lead weights and you question if finishing this run is going to be realistic. Focusing on the mile you are in, whether you are feeling good or feeling bad, allows you to get through it and on to the next one. One hard mile doesn’t mean that they will all be hard. One good mile doesn’t mean they will all be good. For some, a mile might even seem like an impossible distance to push through. I break down the mile into quarters. When you are at .25 of a mile you are only .25 away from being half way finished. At the half way mark you are only .25 away from being 75 percent finished. Once 75 percent of the way through a mile you can certainly push through another .25. When that mile is over ask yourself if you have a little bit more. The answer will most likely be yes. Begin the mile process over again if need be. Tell yourself I only have to do this for .25 more and then asses how you feel. As a veteran of 20 marathons I can not tell you how many times I have had to break down long runs of 20 miles into quarters of a mile just to finish. Focus on the moment, mile by mile, and you will find that the long run isn’t as hard mentally as you once thought. Long runs are part fitness, part heart. Make your mind run your body; you are in control of your running destiny.