Quotes & Sayings About Running A Marathon

And when those bombs went off, there were runners who, after finishing a marathon, kept running for another two miles to the hospital to donate blood. So, here's what I know
these maniacs may have tried to make life bad for the people of Boston, but all they can ever do, is show just how good those people are. — Stephen Colbert

We have all learned everything we know physically - from walking to running a marathon - by trial and error, so there's no reason to become our own worst enemies when we suffer a setback. From time to time everyone falls short of their goals. It's an illusion to believe that champions succeed because they do everything perfectly. You can be certain that every archer who hits the bull's-eye has also missed the bull's-eye a thousand times while learning the skill. — Amby Burfoot

Writing is like running a marathon. One needs stamina and perseverance. The right preparation and pacing get results. — K.J. Kilton

This is your first marathon. Possibly, you'll want it to be your last. Focus on future races draws energy from the one in front of you. Like the mileage that comprises them, train for marathons one at a time. — Gina Greenlee

You can actually suffer a little bit more going slowly than when you're going really fast. A faster marathon might even be easier than a slow one, in terms of what it takes out of you mentally. — Frank Shorter

For Indigenous peoples , the impact of separating us from our heritage goes directly to the heart that pumps life through our peoples. To expect a people to be able to enjoy their culture without their cultural heritage and their sacred belongings is equivalent to amputating their legs and digging up the ground and asking them to run a marathon. — Mick Dodson

Running a marathon with a backpack is tough and may hinder you from winning the race. Don't let the baggage from your past - heavy with fear, guilt, and anger - slow you down. — Maddy Malhotra

I started running outside when I was at 'Biggest Loser.' Then I got runner's knee, and thought I was never going to be able to shake it. When I overcame that and ran the L.A. Marathon, it was such an amazing thing, and now running is such a part of my routine. — Alison Sweeney

I thought about running a marathon a long time ago, but I'm just not a runner. — Shannon Miller

The marathon never ceases to be a race of joy, a race of wonder. — Hal Higdon

When you undertake a daunting task, an adventure bigger than you ever thought you'd take on, you don't get to know what challenges the universe will present to you on the way. You can decide where you will go and how much money you'll spend and what your activities will be, but there will always be something unexpected, a hurdle of sorts, that offers you an opportunity to learn something about yourself if you take it in stride. — Cami Ostman

Marathon: (noun)
A popular form of overpriced torture wherein participants wake up at ass-o-clock in the morning and stand in the freezing cold until it's time to run, at which point they miserably trot for a god-awful interval of time that could be better spent sleeping in and/or consuming large quantities of beer and cupcakes.
See also: masochism, awfulness, "a bunch of bullshit", boob-chafing, cupcake deprivation therapy — Matthew Inman

If you've nurtured your Spirit and trained your Mind as well as your Body you'll be prepared with everything you need to draft across the finish. Remember: all the training runs when you didn't feel like running but ran anyway and felt so good physically but also about yourself. Envision the flash of friendly faces waiting to greet you. Celebrate that you have more energy now than you ever dreamed. Revel in the uptick in personal productivity and self-worth. Yes, you will run a marathon. And you will finish. — Gina Greenlee

If you're running a 26-mile marathon, remember that every mile is run one step at a time. If you are writing a book, do it one page at a time. If you're trying to master a new language, try it one word at a time. There are 365 days in the average year. Divide any project by 365 and you'll find that no job is all that intimidating. — Charles R. Swindoll

To describe the agony of a marathon to someone who's never run it is like trying to explain color to someone who was born blind. — Jerome Drayton

It's not that your back hurts, .. You get these horrible, ice cream brain-freeze headaches. So I would go in on the weekends and get these things called blood patches, where they'd shoot blood into your spine. It was like running a marathon to get it done. — George Clooney

Listen to your body. Do not be a blind and deaf tenant. — George A. Sheehan

The marathon is a charismatic event. It has everything. It has drama. It has competition. Every jogger can't dream of being an Olympic champion, but he can dream of finishing a marathon. — Fred Lebow

Running a marathon is just like reading a good book. After a while you're just not conscious of the physical act of reading. — Frank Shorter

I pulled a hamstring during the New York City Marathon. An hour into the race, I jumped off the couch ... — David Letterman

I've been running a full marathon every year for more than 20 years, and my record is getting worse. Getting older, getting worse. It's natural. — Haruki Murakami

What's at the core of your desire to run a marathon? Couple this journey with value beyond miles. The meaning you ascribe to your effort crystalizes your motivation and fuels your commitment to stay the course and go the distance. — Gina Greenlee

I spent the first twenty years of my running career trying to run as many miles as I could as fast as I could. Then I spent the next twenty years trying to figure out how to run the least amount of miles needed to finish a marathon. And I've come to the conclusion the second way is much more enjoyable. — Jeff Galloway

I am a runner. Last October, there was a marathon here in Beijing. I didn't participate this time, but friends told me that the run wasn't prepared too well. The organizers had only arranged about three hours' worth of food and water supplies. Most people don't finish within three hours, however. Too bad for them - or so it seemed. In fact, however, even those finishing last were perfectly taken care of, particularly during the fourth and fifth hour when demand is highest. — Zhang Xin

At first I would be taken aback by that observation, then I would think of them seeing other drummers on television, often faking it or playing less physically demanding music, and understood why they had that impression. I guess drumming wasn't hard work for every drummer, but it certainly was for me, the way I liked to play - as hard as I could, as fast as I could, as long as I could, and as well as I could. Playing a Rush concert was the hardest job I knew, and took everything I had, mentally and physically. I once compared it to running a marathon while solving equations, and that was a good enough analogy. — Neil Peart

It's not easy to run a marathon, I know it will be painful but when I start it, I know I'm going to finish it — Fauja Singh

The system-versus-goals model can be applied to most human endeavors. In the world of dieting, losing twenty pounds is a goal, but eating right is a system. In the exercise realm, running a marathon in under four hours is a goal, but exercising daily is a system. In business, making a million dollars is a goal, but being a serial entrepreneur is a system. — Scott Adams

Falling apart in a 5K is painful, but it's just pain. Falling apart in a marathon, I believe you lose a year of your life. You complete the marathon feeling utterly defeated, knowing that it got the best of you, and you go home and ask your mom if she still loves you. — Jacob Frey

Best wishes for a great marathon. Be sure to savor it. The first marathon is something special. Run long and healthy. — Amby Burfoot

If you are losing faith in human nature, go out and watch a marathon. — Kathrine Switzer

But most of all I was inspired by the stirring examples of all the other runners. In some pictures they would seem like tiny dots in a mosaic, but each had a separate narrative starting a few months or a lifetime earlier and finishing that day in the New York City Marathon, the race with 37,000 stories. — Mark Sutcliffe

Most people have this perception that you have to be out there running for an hour and a half every day. But you don't have to give up your career and family to run a marathon. — Jeff Galloway

Every runner has a specific motivation and inspiration for running a marathon. This year, all 36,000 of us will 'run together' to demonstrate the spirit of the marathon. We will still have our individual motivations, but we will be unified under the Boston Strong umbrella. — Meb Keflezighi

When I came to New York in 1978, I was a full-time school teacher and track runner, and determined to retire from competitive running. But winning the New York City Marathon kept me running for another decade. — Grete Waitz

Running for office is similar to being a trial lawyer in a very long trial. It requires adrenaline and stamina; it requires being in shape mentally and emotionally. It's a marathon. — Kamala Harris

Of course it was painful, and there were times when, emotionally, I just wanted to chuck it all. But pain seems to be a precondition for this kind of sport. If pain weren't involved, who in the world would ever go to the trouble of taking part in sports like the triathlon or the marathon, which demand such an investment of time and energy? It's precisely because of the pain, precisely because we want to overcome that pain, that we can get the feeling, through this process, of really being alive
or at least a partial sense of it. Your quality of experience is based not on standards such as time or ranking, but on finally awakening to an awareness of the fluidity within action itself. — Haruki Murakami

Your vision of your future will help you press forward. Take a few minutes to envision where you want to be in one year or two or five. Then take action to prepare yourselves. People don't just run a marathon when they decide to do it. They must train daily, slowly building stamina and endurance to run the 26.2-mile distance. So it is with life. It is daily diligence with prayer and scripture study that will help you reach your goals. Your daily decisions will influence generations. — Elaine S. Dalton

There are times when you run a marathon and you wonder, Why am I doing this? But you take a drink of water, and around the next bend, you get your wind back, remember the finish line, and keep going. — Steve Jobs

It doesn't matter how sensitive you are or how damn smart and educated you are, if you're not both at the same time, if your heart and your brain aren't connected, aren't working together harmoniously, well, you're just hopping through life on one leg. You may think you're walking, you may think you're running a damn marathon, but you're only on a hop trip. The connections gotta be maintained. — Tom Robbins

training for the marathon is that in order to maintain a positive attitude about training and running, it is necessary to develop a positive attitude about life in general. It is almost impossible to be positive about — David Whitsett

In some respects, progressing through life is like running a marathon. — Joseph B. Wirthlin

... sense of futility that comes from doing anything merely to prove to yourself that you can do it: having a child, climbing a mountain, making some sexual conquest, committing suicide.
The marathon is a form of demonstrative suicide, suicide as advertising: it is running to show you are capable of getting every last drop of energy out of yourself, to prove it ... to prove what? That you are capable of finishing. Graffiti carry the same message. They simply say: I'm so-and-so and I exist! They are free publicity for existence.
Do we continually have to prove to ourselves that we exist? A strange sign of weakness, harbinger of a new fanaticism for a faceless performance, endlessly self-evident. — Jean Baudrillard

Writing a novel is like running a marathon. Selling one is like building a castle. You gotta do it one brick at a time. — Charles R. Hall

The key to running a good marathon is to not listen to anyone's advice the last week before the race. That's when people tend to do stupid things that disrupt all the input and training of the previous months. — Don Kardong

If an athlete takes a shortcut - literally, for example, by running a street that shortens the marathon route by a quarter mile - he or she doesn't have an insurmountable advantage. But it's an unfair advantage, and in a field of equally matched athletes, it's more than enough to make a difference. — Don Kardong

You wouldn't run a marathon the day before you run a marathon, you need to leave some sort of surprise for your body. — Greg James

Anybody who is running a marathon or doing a walkathon, doing a fundraiser for their school, their company, by far it's guaranteed the easiest and most fun way to quickly set up a fundraising campaign and send it around to your friends and family. — Edward Norton

Though sporting a hideous mustache is in no way comparable to the physical pain and mental suffering men with these diseases endure, Movember still forces participants to challenge their manhood on a daily basis. Growing a moustache for men's cancer isn't as feel-good an activity as running a marathon for a cure. — David Sax

The Marathon distance is very difficult to cover and without the support of all of the fans and people cheering us on and the other runners, we would have a very difficult time to run the full race. So we work together to make a marathon happen. — Tilahun Regassa

A marathon is a like a roller coaster ... You might toss your cookies, jump for joy, pass out, or have to close your eyes and just breathe. Even when it is going smooth, all of a sudden there can be a drop or even better, an acceleration. Hang on, stick to your plan, and enjoy every step of the way. I can't wait to do another ... or maybe ten! Get after it! — Carrie Tollefson

A novel is something that stands at the end of a lengthy process called writing. It is not a preexisting Platonic form embedded within the writer... I do not have a Boston marathon inside me waiting to get out. The marathon is a peak experience I am rightly entitled to only as the culmination of years of regular training and love of running. — Victoria Nelson

Good God. He felt like he'd just finished running the Boston Marathon.
How did she do it? How the hell did she do all that every day, and probably a lot more? But just
the dinner, the squabbles, the mess, the sheer volume of stuff that needed to be remembered, done,
handled with three kids. It was mentally and physically exhausting.
Fun, he admitted, but exhausting.
And she'd have to get up in the morning, get them up, dressed, fed. Then go to work. After
work, she'd replay - basically - what he'd just done. And with all that, she still had to maintain the house
and run a business.
Did women have superpowers?
Regardless, he was sending his mother flowers in the morning. — Nora Roberts

Living life is like running a marathon. It takes a lot of courage and tenacity to keep going till the end. — Fauja Singh

Imagine that a career is like a marathon - a long, grueling, and ultimately rewarding endeavor. Now imagine a marathon where both men and women arrive at the starting line equally fit and trained. The gun goes off. The men and women run side by side. The male marathoners are routinely cheered on: "Lookin' strong! On your way!" But the female runners hear a different message. "You know you don't have to do this!" the crowd shouts. Or "Good start - but you probably won't want to finish." The farther the marathoners run, the louder the cries grow for the men: "Keep going! You've got this!" But the women hear more and more doubts about their efforts. External voices, and often their own internal voice, repeatedly question their decision to keep running. The voices can even grow hostile. As the women struggle to endure the rigors of the race, spectators shout, "Why are you running when your children need you at home? — Sheryl Sandberg

If it's a nod from society you're looking for, run a marathon. But if it's a life-changing experience of personal strength and perseverance that you want, finish an ultra. — Vanessa Runs

Aiming for the marathon is a task of sorts which can include terrific highs and lows. — Bill Rodgers

Marathon running, like golf, is a game for players, not winners. That is why Callaway sells golf clubs and Nike sells running shoes. But running is unique in that the world's best racers are on the same course, at the same time, as amateurs, who have as much chance of winning as your average weekend warrior would scoring a touchdown in the NFL. — Hunter S. Thompson

I think animation is like running a marathon, and making a movie is like a 100 meter sprint. The question is: are you a marathon man or are you a sprinter? I realized that I was more of a sprinter than a marathon man. With a long, long project, I get bored easily. — Marjane Satrapi

The operation goes on and on. I'm exhausted by it. I don't know how the doctors have the stamina to keep up. They're standing still, but it seems harder than running a marathon. — Gayle Forman

Success breeds success on a marathon route. If you can prove to yourself that you are doing well, then invariably you will do even better. — Phil Hewitt

If I waited to be in the mood to write, I'd barely have a chapbook of material to my name. Who would ever be in the mood to write? Do marathon runners get in the mood to run? Do teachers wake up with the urge to lecture? I don't know, but I doubt it. My guess is that it's the very act that is generative. The doing of the thing that makes possible the desire for it. — Dani Shapiro

Few things in life match the thrill of a marathon. — Fred Lebow

Finish: Even if you run a slower than expected time, you succeed in any marathon when you finish. — Hal Higdon

I am happy that I ran the half-marathon, but to me, just running and saying that I finished a race isn't enough for me. I want to run the race as best as I can. Working out for pants size isn't enough. I need a goal or a race to get back on the treadmill every day. — Drew Carey

The difference between the mile and the marathon is the difference between burning your fingers with a match and being slowly roasted over hot coals. — Hal Higdon

You plant a garden one flower at a time ... You write a book one word at a time, clean a closet one shelf at a time, run a marathon one step at a time. If you feel defeated by some large task, get your spade and dig the first hole. — Jeanne Marie Laskas

A Marathon is not about running, it is about salvation. We spend so much of our lives doubting ourselves, thinking we're not good enough, not strong enough, not made of the right stuff. The Marathon is an opportunity for redemption. "Opportunity," because the outcome is uncertain. "Opportunity," because it is up to you, and only you, to make it happen; only you can turn your farfetched dream into a reality. — Dean Karnazes

Doing the long endurance stuff seems to have given me the strength to sustain the speed. I think my body is just a lot stronger (thanks to the marathon) ... By increasing the long runs, I found that does not take anything away from the speed but increases the strength on the track. — Paula Radcliffe

Training is essential for almost any significant endeavor in life - running a marathon, becoming a surgeon, learning how to play the piano. — John Ortberg

Friedrich Nietzsche got pretty hung up on the notion of human will; really all he needed were some running shoes, Lycra and a place in the Berlin Marathon. — Phil Hewitt

Marathon training doesn't have to be a grind. By running for about 30 minutes two times a week, and by gradually increasing the length of a third weekly run-the long run-anyone can finish a marathon. — Jeff Galloway

You're running out of tomorrows.
Running out of tomorrows, I repeated to myself in my room, sprawling across my bed to begin another midnight marathon of homework. Sometimes I felt as if there were no tomorrows, that everything, my whole life, was crammed into one long day. A continuous stretch of meaningless time. Sometimes I even wished there was no tomorrow, if this was all I had to look forward to. (Chapter.10) — Julie Anne Peters

My husband and I both have our bucket lists. Running a marathon was on mine. — Alison Sweeney

Sometimes for me not throwing a tantrum is what running a marathon or swimming the English Channel must be like for others of a less-challenging emotional nature ... — Roseanne Barr

The marathon is like a bullfight. — Alberto Salazar

Running a marathon is something I've always wanted to do. — Jennie Finch

Playing a three-hour Rush show is like running a marathon while solving equations. — Neil Peart

Training for a marathon is much like climbing a ladder. Each ring is a short-term goal that must be met in sequence in order to reach the long-term goal at the top of the ladder. — Richard Benyo

Everyone wins the marathon. We all have the same feeling at the start-nervous, anxious, excited. It is a broader, richer, and even with twenty-seven thousand people-more intimate experience than I found when racing in track. New York is the marathon that all the biggest stars want to win, but has also been the stage for an array of human stories more vast than any other sporting event. — Grete Waitz

Racing a marathon is a true and simple way to test the human spirit. Whether it goes perfectly or poorly you will certainly learn something about yourself and be a better person for having tackled the distance. — Blake Russell

I wanted to try marathon running, but something always came up: I had a baby and a C-section or I got injured or I just didn't think I could run that far. — Veronica Webb

The 2013 Boston Marathon was, for me, a milestone. A bucket list event that was supposed to be my last marathon until my next big milestone, turning 50. But I couldn't leave marathoning on a memory like that, so I am running this year to honor everyone in the running community and those unsung heroes from April 15, 2013. — Summer Sanders

When you get close to race day, there's that anticipation and excitement - it's the same whatever level you're running at because the marathon is like a festival. — Paula Radcliffe

Life is a marathon, not a sprint; pace yourself accordingly. — Amby Burfoot

The biggest thing that I've learned is to run the marathon, not the sprint. By that I mean, don't let the little problems that you face in the hour in daily life cast a shadow over the larger joys that you have, over the course of the years. — Jon Foreman

The New York Marathon: a fantastic event. — Pope John Paul II

If you're ninety-five percent of the way to outstanding success, doesn't it make sense to go the additional five percent of the way? ... A marathon which takes hours to run, can be won or lost by a matter of seconds. — Ralph Marston

I love to run. I was challenged to run the New York marathon four months after having my youngest son, and since running isn't a big part of softball, the thought of a marathon was a stretch for me. — Jennie Finch

I remember when I first began writing, I would spend maybe five or six hours on perhaps two paragraphs, and at the end of the day, not only were the paragraphs pretty terrible but I was also exhausted by the effort. I clearly wasn't in shape. You don't just tie on a pair of running shoes and go out and run a marathon. You have to be in running shape, just like you have to be in writing shape. — Julie Tetel Andresen

Sometimes it's just surreal out there, while you're running a marathon. People just standing out in the cold, even the rain, cheering for you, blasting music for you. It's an awesome show of camaraderie and community. — John Roberts

It had been said that the marathon doesn't really begin until mile twenty. I say mile twenty-six would be more appropriate. The final two-tenths of a mile is filled with emotion. No matter how desperately you're struggling at this point, thoughts typically drift away from the immediate task at hand (ie, survival) to broader feelings. — Dean Karnazes

If running a marathon excites you, create space in your life for it. Adding a new commitment means recalibrating different areas of your world. Logging more miles as your race date approaches means less time invested in other pursuits. Not forever, just during the months you train. Too, you will find how training fits into your world serves not only crossing the finish but other areas of life. — Gina Greenlee

It's a bit like running a marathon, isn't it? It's only when you reach the finish line that you have time to collapse. — Lucinda Riley

When using the run-walk method to finish a marathon, the most important walk break comes in the first mile. The second most important one comes in the second mile, and so on. The point is, walk before you become fatigued. — Jeff Galloway

I love my lifestyle now, but at the end of nine months, you're toast. You are toast. It's like running a marathon. You can't think while you're doing it. Especially when different directors come in who are not part of the posse, the circle. — Christopher Meloni

The pride in finishing a marathon is much greater than all the pain endured during the marathon. — Hal Higdon

The music for 'The Last Five Years' is like running a 26-mile marathon, and singing Sondheim is like ballroom-dancing up Everest. — Anna Kendrick

Even though I can't tell others whether they should chase their marathon dreams, I highly recommend they do something completely out of character, something they never in a million years thought they'd do, something they may fail miserably at. Because sometimes the places where you end up finding your true self are the places you never thought to look. That, and I don't want to be the only one who sucks at something. — Dawn Dais

The world is full of people who have dreams of playing at Carnegie Hall, of running a marathon, and of owning their own business. The difference between the people who make it across the finish line and everyone else is one simple thing: an action plan. — John Tesh

No doubt a brain and some shoes are essential for marathon success, although if it comes down to a choice, pick the shoes. More people finish marathons with no brains than with no shoes. — Don Kardong