I ran 7.5 miles the other day, most I’ve ran since running the New York Marathon in November 2013, and certainly the most pain free. A half and full marathon in the next 6 months is become more tangible. Things are falling into place. One thing I haven’t mentioned on this blog is how much my running coach has helped me.
Yep, a running coach. He’s a local guy, pretty well known in these parts, and like me, dabbled in some drugs and went to treatment and seems to be stone cold sober now. I take his words with me on many runs and he sings, screams, and raps in my ear. These words mean little to me at any other time of the day, but during the throes of a run, I have come to rely on them. Especially as I take my long runs up and down 8 mile.
On being tired and wanting to stop.
“Sometimes you just feel tired, feel weak. When you feel weak, you feel like you just wanna just give up. But you gotta search within you, try and find that inner strength. And just pull that shit out of you, and get that motivation not to give up. And not be a quitter no matter how bad you wanna just fall flat on your face.”
My coach knows what it's like to run off the rage and despair of your day:
"Some days I just wanna up and call it quits, I feel like I'm surrounded by a wall of bricks. Every time I go to get up I just fall in pits, My life's like one great big ball of shit.”
He even gave me this running mantra:
“I'm a rip this shit till my bones collapse”
When I fear I may waste months of training on race day, he often gives me this speech:
“This is your moment, And every single minute you get, try to hold on to it 'cause you may never get it again. So while you're in it, try to get as much shit as you can. And when your run is over. Just admit when it's at it's end.”
As I run more and more without a watch and worry less about speedwork these days, he still encourages me to try and kick ass with words like this:
“Fuck this clock! I’m gonna make them Eat this watch. Don't believe me Watch! I'm gonna win this race, and come back and rub my shit in your face.”
My Boston qualifier, when I stood nervous in the chute looking calm and steady, but their was vomit on my bib already, (carb-loading spaghetti) Eminem was there pumping me up, saying:
"Look, if you had one shot, one opportunity, to seize everything you ever wanted, one moment. Would you capture it, or let it slip?"
Yes, it's all true. If you could hear me think during some of my greatest runs, you wouldn’t just hear my own thoughts, but you'd also hear Slim Shady, Marshall Bruce Mathers, aka Eminem howling…
”Success is my only motherfucking option, failure's not.”
A True Running Coach. Find your own if you want to, but no matter what, I'm thinking that the main message should always be:
"You can do anything you set your mind to, man."
