Last week we started talking about the beauty of movement, especially in the face of limitation. To continue our conversation and further illustrate this idea, I asked my friend and veteran marathon runner, Steve Wiens, to write about what it is like to move through the last few miles of a race. Enjoy!
There is More, by Steve Wiens
Everyone who has run a marathon insists that the marathon is
really two races: the first twenty miles, and the last six point two.
During the first twenty miles, assuming you have adequately
trained, your body does what you have prepared it to do: At mile 10, you wonder
why you don’t run marathons every day of your life. Thousands of people shout
your name, cow bells echo the clarion call of your own personal greatness,
endorphins pulse through your body, and the road floats beneath you as you
glide through the miles with effortless joy.
At mile fifteen, your legs begin to feel fatigued, but you
still enjoy the race. I’ve even had deliriously happy moments at this phase of
the race when I felt sad about the inevitable finish line looming in the
distance; I didn’t want it to end!
But at mile twenty, it all begins to change. The glycogen in
your body is rapidly decreasing. What used to be a slight ache in your hips is
now constant and sharp, as if you are missing some essential lubricant, without
which you will grind to a halt, in a heap of smoke and bones and pain. The
bottoms of your feet, which used to feel fluid and graceful, are now made of
iron; they’re heavy and they clang in protest with every foot strike.
If the first twenty miles are mostly physical, the last 6.2
are all mental.
Steve at mile 25 during his 9th marathon |
Fans lining the sides of the course, noticing your obvious
pain, will shout encouraging banalities like, “You’re almost there!” even
though you know you are nowhere near the end. Your mind and your body are now
engaged in full-scale war. Your body demands that you quit this foolish,
meaningless quest. I have run 10 marathons, and I cannot recall even once when
I did not desperately want to quit somewhere between mile 20 and the finish.
In the last two miles of the race, your focus narrows. You
feel every stab of pain, your brain is foggy with dehydration, the blister on
the back of your heel is now open and raw, and you can’t believe you haven’t
seen the mile 25 marker yet. You convince yourself that in your state of
semi-delirium, you must have missed it. But something inside you knows you have
not.
Mile 25 is a torture chamber. But as you creep by the miler
marker, you realize that you are going to finish. Though the pain continues to increase,
your mind has conquered, and your body has given in. You know that you are
going to finish. I have run one particular marathon 9 times, so I know every
step of the way intimately, especially the last 1.2 miles. At mile 26, the
runners turn slightly left, crest a gentle hill, and then the finish line comes
into view. In that moment, a wash of emotion comes over me that causes me to weep,
every single time. By some act of exquisite grace on the part of the course
planners, these last two tenths of a mile are mostly downhill, and sometimes I
draw on the last drips of glycogen that remain in my body and attempt to sprint
down that hill and across that mat, signifying that the race has ended, and I
have endured.
I do not run for the medals, tee shirts, for accolades from
friends, or because I’m addicted to competition. I run marathons because of
what is forged in the crucible of those last painful miles of the marathon:
when I fear that there is nothing left, there is more.
There is more.
Great post Steve. Love it. Thinking about a marathon... haven't committed yet!
ReplyDeleteI remember a few years ago when you talked about the last few miles of a marathon and how you told you body it will not win. Even if it is crying out for you to stop.I think of your story when my body is saying go ahead have that cookie or whatever.It was good to be reminded again of your story. Love, Diane
ReplyDeleteThanks Charlie - looking forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks!
ReplyDeleteThanks Diana! But sometimes you should eat the cookie
ReplyDelete