Run your own Race

My old cross country coach had some great advice for the longer distance races.  He told me not to worry about being in that lead pack, not to worry about the spilt times and not to panic when the pace was too fast or too slow. Stay focused at the task at hand and have faith in your training; he would repeat over to me minutes before the gun went off - Run your own race.

This photo exemplifies that idea perfectly. It was published in the Boston Marathon newsletter a few months ago. At the 15k mark, Desi Davila is over 30 meters behind the lead pack running all on her own. Tactics and strategy say it’s best to run in a pack and to stay in contact with leaders in order to cover any moves a competitor may make to break away. 

But running her own race and not getting caught up in the lead pack paid off tremendously. In the end she caught all but one of that pack as each runner faltered. She missed the leader by only two seconds and broke the American Record on a very tough Boston course. She focused on her race, followed her gut, and the result was amazing.

This concept is applicable in life as well.  I have a lot of friends following their own career paths, getting married, settling down, and that … freaks me out sometimes because I’m not even close to getting to that point any time soon. That’s fine though; it’s their life, it’s their journey and sometimes the worst thing you can do is push yourself into someone else’s race.

Run your own race and wonderful things will happen.