"More than 6 months ago me, my brother and a coterie of running buddies were left to rue on that epochal date. The date: January 10, 2010. This is day of the marathon, a full 42.3k running event. If you are a running enthusiast, it is the holy grail of running, where you test yourself, stamina and will if you got what it takes to cross the line or if you did the right amount of training for the past 4-5 months which includes waking up on an ungodly hour, around 3am, just to run. This is an event separating the chaff from the grain, the grain being the well prepared, and the chaff to those making a huge mistake of not respecting the distance. Able to finish or not, the grimacing pain will paint a whole new picture on your face, the one that is either dying or just had his wisdom tooth pulled out with no anesthesia.
It is as epochal as the Battle of Normandy, the pivotal war on Gettysburg, the bombing of Hiroshima or the liberation of the Philippines from the Japanese, something to that effect. Or to tone it down a bit, it is like your wedding day. Or maybe something else but something that feels and looks daunting. It looms like that prodigious reptile from the movie Godzilla, scary and ready to gobble up a puny creature. It just looms large.
Well, it is definitely not for the faint-hearted--- metaphor aside, it is not for someone who is heart-deficient either---- aside from waking up early on weekends, you risk getting run over by passing cars, if you’re the vain-type then the heat will scorch you up, then there's uneasy feeling of sapping energy and body pain like you are being mug twice over. If you are not ready for it and don't feel committed to it then by all means throw in the towel because surely you will gassed-out on Km25.
The key is commitment. You increase your stamina on a gradual phase for a period of 4-5 months or upwards for those who are not physically sound. It feels like going to school again with the lecturing and studying, then commencing with the final exam. Like in schooling, if you don't study you are likely to fail with all likelihood except if you are under a fuzzy teacher who's got a fuzzy memory. The point is, like that medieval movie I watched eons ago, where the sword teacher emphatically told someone " if you can't raise that sword, then grow strong", referring to someone who doesn't know how to handle a sword much more raise it because it was heavy and he was frail.
To do a rephrasing of that line it would go like this: "If you don't have a runner's stamina for a marathon, then build freaking stamina".
That's what I and my running buddies have been exactly doing for the past 5 months, building freaking stamina. Whether I am feeling lethargic, groggy and totally not for it, I was building freaking stamina. Whether there is some semblance of recurring pain on the knees or in the heel or in the hip, it doesn't excuse you from pounding the ground. You constantly pound the mitts like a pugilist do.
Now, the epochal date looms near, and it is like it is calling me ready to frighten the body out of me. But, I have prepared for it, hell I have sold my soul for it to make it more emphatic. They say it is tough and painful, well, I can always retort the old adage: Tell that to the Marines!
You regret only the things you didn’t do, and for all it’s worth this experience will be etched on stone."
Harold Perral
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