This morning I ran 4.2 km. This morning I ran 10% of 42 km—the distance between the cities of Athens and Marathon. Hence the name and distance of this renowned race.
One year ago, today, I ran my first full marathon—and no, I don't want to show off, give a technical recipe or convince anyone to run one. My aim here is to document what I learned from it, for my future self and for curious folks from the www.
In context, at 32 years of age, I tried many sports but never achieved any sport-related goals. In fact, I only got to the top of the climbing bar in my last year of high school.
Searching for confidence boosts and quick wins, I decided to run a 10 km race. As soon as I told this to my workmate, he pointed out the Imposter Syndrome I was having. So the goal was raised to 21 km (half marathon).
It was hard work, both for training and for the race itself. Although it felt like a good pain afterward—so a few days later I signed up for another half marathon starting in a few months.
On the same day, I finished my second half marathon, in the same fashion, I signed up for a full marathon starting in 45 days. It was a terrifying decision, but it felt like "now or never".
In theory, my full marathon training only lasted for 30 days. The rest was momentum.
A 42 km race is no joke. It requires commitment, extensive planning, and training. Doubt and fear arise at many points during training.
It's so easy to find excuses on the internet. "I'm feeling lethargic after running for hours", "My heart rate is out of wack", "My knees hurt when I run like an idiot", "Can vegetarians run marathons at all?", and so forth.
Good news: it is also very easy to find solutions, tutorials, videos, communities, and all sorts of content to solve whatever problem you are trying to solve. This applies to almost every discipline on Earth. The key is to break down the big mission into small, googleable problems—then tackle them one by one.
Most marathon runners would agree that it's 20% physical and 80% mental. In a marathon, there's a lot of time to talk to yourself—and the outcome it's highly dependent on the quality and content of the conversation you're having with yourself—just as in life in general.
The Cookie Jar is a concept I took from David Goggins's book "Can't Hurt Me". It refers to the repository of memories about personal achievements —big and small— that you can tap on whenever you feel like there's nothing left in you. And it bloody works!
Before Race Day, I listed down all of the things that I had made happen for myself until that point. At km #38 my legs stopped working to the point where I was barely walking. For five minutes I found ten thousand arguments to support the idea that quitting was the only option left. But—suddenly, a random Melburnian in the crowd said to me "Come on, mate. You're almost there." That was a good enough reminder to put all of my attention in my Cookie Jar. Two seconds later I was running again—which was just a natural consequence of gaining control back over my thoughts.
*I highly recommend this book to anyone who is training for a marathon or anything difficult really, or if you just want to live a better life.
- Two days before Race Day, I shaved my head to cut the wind aerodynamically out of anxiety.
- In the first half marathon I was so nervous that I took the wrong train and almost missed the race.