Read Online 50/50 by Dean Karnazes - Free Book Online Page B

course at a decent clip, which was probably unsettling for the first-timers. By the halfway point, at least one runner, an athletic-looking woman in her early twenties, was struggling. Nevertheless, she refused to allow herself to become separated from the main group. She had come here to complete her first marathon and was determined to do just that. When her turn came to talk about herself, she said her name was Sarah Sherman; she was a graduate student in the athletics department at the University of Nebraska. Her father happened to be Mike Sherman, the former head coach of the Green Bay Packers football team. Clearly some of his gridiron toughness had rubbed off.
    Where Runners Gather
    Group runs and events are not the only environments where runners can fellowship and share camaraderie. You can also do it online. There are several running Web sites with lively forums where runners can swap stories, advice, and ideas. Here are a few:
    • www.active.com
    • www.runnersweb.com
    • www.runnersworld.com
    • www.runningtimes.com
    • www.thefinalsprint.com
     
    Then I noticed that the two triathletes who had planned to stop at the halfway point, hadn’t. Perhaps they wanted to help Sarah make it to the finish line, or perhaps they were inspired by her grit and determination, and were feeding off it, as I was.
    Marathons normally don’t work this way. In big events such as the real Lincoln Marathon, each participant runs his or her own race. Sure, plenty of people run in pairs or small groups, with stronger runners holding themselves back to stay with slower friends, and slower runners pushing harder so as not to weigh down their friends too much. But this situation was different. Almost our entire field of participants was clinging together, and the differences in ability levels were extreme. Some of the runners could have been literally miles up the road if they had chosen to run as hard as they could. On the other side, Sarah and some of the others probably would have been going much slower if not for the pull created by the stronger members of the group.
    As much as I love to run alone, I’ve never lost sight of the fact that running with others motivates me to push harder than I might solo. When competing in ultramarathons, for example, the desire to catch another runner often pulls me forward, and the desire not to be overtaken frequently propels me forward with a similar energy. It’s a fundamental law of racing: Our best times are better when we run together.
    Nor is this phenomenon limited to competitive environments. Recently I participated in a multiday outback run in Australia that pushed me as close to the brink of surrender as any mind-over-body challenge I have ever experienced. One powerful motivator kept me from surrendering, and that was my bond with my support crew, whose members were working as hard to get me to the finish line as I was working to get myself there. The thought of letting my crew down by quitting was unbearable, so I did not quit.
    The same thing happened throughout the Endurance 50. Whenever the relentless grind of running a marathon every morning, talking to reporters, posing for photos and signing things until mid afternoon, and answering e-mails and updating my blog while riding hundreds of miles on the tour bus into the night began to wear my spirit down, tempting me to raise a white flag, I thought about the immense passion and energy my crew was pouring into my dream, which had in many ways become their dream too. And this thought annihilated my white-flag fantasies every time. There was just no way I could disappoint Koop, Garrett, Hopps, and the others, not to mention my fellow runners and the thousands of people across the globe who were following our progress.
    As we passed the twenty-mile mark, I began to doubt whether Sarah could continue, even with the support of the group. She was clearly in a world of hurt, running with her eyes half-closed and no longer able to say