Running a 100 miles is obviously a serious physical challenge. However, the true test of an endurance event is often the mental aspect. Despite the good physical condition you’re in, 100 miles will test you psychologically in ways that can surpass the physical. The key is to “keep your head when all about you are losing theirs…”

Tomorrow morning I head out to Huntsville, TX, for my 2nd attempt at running 100 miles. My running has been good. I’ve been cross-training and strength training. I’ve remained uninjured. So everything should be in place for a successful event.

Enter Sunday night (yes, 6 days before my race)…a stomach virus. Yikes! This same thing happened the week before I was to run the Bear 100 back in September. I haven’t had a virus in 20 years, and now I have had 2 in the last 6 months.

It’s not uncommon to catch a bug as you begin to taper after months of hard training. And, I figure I’ve actually been pretty lucky because this is only the 3rd time it’s ever happened to me in all my years of racing.

As I was in the throes of “the bug,” I honestly thought to myself, “I am so grateful that this is happening now instead of the night before the race.” I’m better now, and I’ll continue to feel better as the race gets closer because I have chosen to focus on good health instead of illness. But I know that, once again, I was being tested.

We are all constantly being tested…physically, mentally, emotionally. Ed Foreman says, “All the water in the world can’t sink a ship unless it gets on the inside.” It’s all about what we allow to enter our minds.

My 10th grade English teacher, Nancy Lonnegan, used to make us memorize poems (among other things), and some lines from Rudyard Kipling’s “If” have stayed with me for the past 35 years…I can’t remember the whole thing, but what I do remember has often helped me keep my head when all about me are losing theirs:

“If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs…/If you can meet with triumph and disaster/And treat those two imposters just the same…/If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew/To serve your turn long after they are gone,/And so hold on when there is nothing in you/Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on’/If you can fill the unforgiving minute/With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run/Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it…”

This weekend I will be tested. My goal is to keep my head when all about me are losing theirs…

My plan today was to run/hike for 8 hours. Well – I only had 6.5 hours in me. Ran the downhills and hiked the uphills. I ran some ups when I could, but it was a good opportunity for me to practice my hiking skills.

Here’s my elevation map for today – talk about blazing some trails. I had no idea how far I was going or what the terrain was going to be. I looked at the Ridge to Rivers map for Shaffer Butte, and I picked a couple of trails. Youch! I went up about 850 feet in my first mile. But it was about 630 am, and it was still a nice and cool 70 degrees. That was fun. Next 3 miles, I added about 300 more feet each mile. What a way to start the day!

See that “V” around mile 4? That trail was named “The Tempest” so I had to check it out. But when it kept going down, down, down…I decided that I would save it for another day. So I only went down about 1/2 mile, then straight back up for a 350 foot climb in 1/2 mile. Geez – think if I had kept going down. Yikes.

After I came down off that side of the mountain, I went over to the Nordic ski lodge where I planned to run some of the cross-country ski trails. Here’s a tip: It was a lot longer than it looked like on the map. Ended up being ~13 miles with the first half of that going down. Aren’t you supposed to finish on the downhill, not the uphill? Who knew?

Then I got turned around the last hour, and I ran out of water. That was a bummer. And it had climbed to almost 90 degrees by that time… and I had more sun by that time – but it was 10 degrees cooler on the mountain than in the city, so that was a plus. I was pretty tired by the time I finally found the lodge (and my car), but I had a frozen bandana (yes a bandana not a banana) in a baggie in my cooler – It had thawed out, but it was still cold and wet – felt so good on my face and neck – ah, what a relief.  I rehydrated when I got to the car and drove home with my cold bandana around my neck.

When I realized I was a little off course at the end…and that I would probably not be going 8 hours today, I thought about something I read a couple of nights ago in Born to Run by Christopher McDougall. At the time, I couldn’t remember exactly, but he says that running is like “the game of life – You never know how hard it will be. You never know when it will end. You can’t control it. You can only adjust.”

I made a few adjustments today, and everything turned out just fine. What a terrific day.

On the celebration of Patriots’ Day, the Boston Marathon makes it appearance as an annual rite of spring on April 20. Runners all over talk about it, train for it, live for it. But only those who qualify, run it. Boston is the only marathon – other than the Olympic marathon – that requires a qualifying time to get in…for regular runners, that is.

Recently, I read an article by Amby Burfoot about “Boston qualifiying.” He cited a statistic that “only 10.4% of marathon finishers achieve a BQ.” That is pretty impressive: Of the thousands of people who run marathons, only 10.4% run fast enough to get into Boston.

I know many friends who have qualified for and run Boston, and I am proud and happy for them. It is a great achievement. Personally, I have attempted to qualify many times but have come up just short of my BQ.  I’m okay with it now, but that was not always my outlook.

Amby’s article brought this back into the front of my brain when I saw the article sidebars entitled “Real Runners.” It has long been implied, and conveyed in articles and books, that the only “real runners” are Boston qualifiers. I used to buy into this thinking … about others and myself. That is, until I met “real” runners.

Don’t misunderstand me. Boston qualifiers are indeed “real” runners; however, I just do not believe that they are the ONLY “real” runners.

“Real” runners:

• love to run
• raise money for worthy causes
• sacrifice their “time” to stop and help a fallen runner
• run a race with a first-timer
• teach others about running
• sometimes do a run-walk
• encourage beginners and veterans alike
• love to talk about running
• love to listen others’ stories about running
• feel nervous for their friends who are running a big race
• are happy for their friends who run a great race
• believe in themselves – that they are real runners
• and sometimes…even qualify for Boston

On March 29th, my friend, Coach Bill Wenmark, completed the Bataan Death March Marathon at the White Sands Missile Base in New Mexico. Not only did he complete the grueling event, he won the 60-69 Civilian Heavy (35# pack) category in 7:29:56, a new age group record.

In Bill’s words: “A great moving experience for civilians, young high school ROTC units and lots of veterans, men and women. Most of all the Walter Reed Wounded Warriors who did the March missing legs and arms. The Bataan survivors in their 80’s and 90’s sat along the start area and greeted each starter….they were back at the finish to greet every finisher.  Some of them will not make it back next year, but those who can will be there again…just like they were for their fellow men in the Bataan Death March.  Some of these men were POW’s for over 3 years – tortured, starved, beaten.  Some of them were too tuff…they made it home so we would never forget.”

Bill is founder and president of, and coaches, the Active Life & Running Club (ALARC), the country’s largest marathon running club. A 2006 World Senior Games gold medalist, Bill has run 96 marathons, 2 Ironman triathlons, and completed the Leadville 100-mile run, in addition to the 100-mile bike race, which he’s done 11 times, one of only 20 in the world to do so.

Bill is also a coach at the Dick Beardsley Marathon Running Camp, which takes place every September in Waubun, Minnesota.

When I was growing up and things seemed to go wrong, my mama would always say: “If everyone put their troubles in a pile for everyone to choose from, you would probably want to pull your own back out. Your problems don’t seem nearly as bad when you look around and see what others are going through.”

Her philosophy was simple but true. I’ve learned to focus on what I have rather than what I don’t have. I learned to look for the “silver lining” in things that seem really bad. And I’ve learned to ask, “What is the opportunity in this?”

Last week, I hurt my hand while I was cross-country skiing. I had some x-rays done, and nothing is broken, but I was referred to a hand specialist. I’ve been to the hand doc twice in the past week, and he definitively determined today that I have a ruptured ulnar collateral ligament, commonly known as skiier’s thumb. So tomorrow, I’m having surgery to repair the damaged ligament.

The catch is this: (more…)

In one week, I’ll be running my first 50-mile race. I’ve been diligently following a training schedule, and I’m ready to give it a go. However, this past week, I’ve been unable to run outside at all. There is snow and ice everywhere! In fact, we had to cancel our (outside) training run with Boise RunWalk (our training group) for the first time ever. The running path was simply unsafe to run on, and it would have been irresponsible to lead a group of runners and walkers on such treacherous conditions.

That said, I’ve had to move indoors and train on a treadmill – and this week will probably be the same.  Not the ideal scenario for the last couple of weeks before a long race, but I’m lucky to be able to get my workouts in at all.

There was a time when I would have stressed out over this “kink” in my training plan – to be honest, a “kink” in any kind of plan would have caused anxiety. However, I’m totally ok with this minor obstacle, and I’ve asked myself: “What is the Opportunity?” in this.

There are several answers to that question: (more…)

A huge piece of competing in any type of event is the mental component. It’s one thing to embrace a physical challenge: we set goals, train, we eat right, and come race day, we are hopefully at our peak performance.

But how do we prepare mentally for what may await us on race morning? (more…)

This morning, 5 days after last Sunday’s marathon, I ran an easy 3 miles along the River. I still have a few aches and pains, but for the most part I feel great. No watch, no headphones, just me, the path, and nature.

I had plenty of time to reflect on things as I ran pretty slowly, and I scanned the years of training and races and people all along my “running path.”  I spent a little more time thinking about my most recent endeavor and the past 6 months.

There was a time in my running (not so long ago) when I believed that in order to legitimize myself as a “real runner” that I HAD to qualify for Boston. Over the past 6 months, my  perspective has changed. I think my earlier belief was really based on what other people thought which I assimilated into my own belief system.

However, more so than any single race, I think my training in the last 6 months and my accumulated running experiences, in my own view, have “legitimized” me. I ran a sub 4 hour marathon in the 2005 Lakeshore Marathon in Chicago (which was inaccurately measured to be a mile too long and thus didn’t count). It didn’t count officially, and I guess I let that “not count” for me. But, really, I was letting it “not count” according to other people, too.

I have said for years, “I am independent of the opinion of others,” and in most things I think I am. But in this particular case, I think maybe I wasn’t as “independent” as I thought I was.

I have passed that threshold now. What matters is not what others consider “legitimate.” What matters is what I think. And, here I am, finally, allowing myself to acknowledge that I have run my sub 4 hour race, and I now what stands out in my mind is what a great “time” I had running that race and every race. Somehow, the clock “time” just doesn’t seem that important anymore.