Running A Race Quotes & Sayings

In an instant, our mind can carry us far away into memories of the past or fantasies about the future. Or we may get caught up in a race against the clock, feeling like there's never enough time. We say things like "Time is flying," "Time is running out," or "There are never enough hours in the day." — Deepak Chopra

I raised that kid like I was running an egg-and-spoon race through a minefield, and he was the egg. — Jonathan Lethem

Is America a weakling, to shrink from the work of the great world powers? No! The young giant of the West stands on a continent and clasps the crest of an ocean in either hand. Our nation, glorious in youth and strength, looks into the future with eager eyes and rejoices as a strong man to run a race. — Theodore Roosevelt

I had a dual goal in my running that was to win and to achieve excellence, so I was never happy with a slow tactical time. If the race were slow I would get in front and pull it up again. I couldn't stand a slow race. A lot of people seem to get screwed up on tactics. There is only one tactic in a race and that is to always be in a position where you can win it. — Herb Elliott

WHEN ASKED, CHARLENE had always explained away her life as a series of false starts that finally had disqualified her from running the race. — Reif Larsen

A short term view will lead to a partial and perhaps twisted view of the whole picture. A crucial element may be missing. We may not be running the entire race. A friend of mine described a colleague as great at running the "ninety-five yard dash." That is a distinction I can do without. Lacking the last five yards makes the first ninety-five pointless. In fact, serious runners thing of it as a 110 yard dash so that no one will best them in the last few yards. You've got to think beyond the whole. — Max De Pree

Professionally I felt like a horse running in the wrong race. — Susan Strasberg

People are always rattling on about what "we" should do, whether they are talking about "their" country or "their" race or all of humanity or some other abstract group of humans who don't give a damn what they think about anything.

Who is "We?" Who can you legitimately speak for? Who cares what you say?

If you don't know, you're just running our mouth. You're just some guy yelling at the TV during a football game. Your "we" can't hear you and if they could, they wouldn't care anyway. — Jack Donovan

When you're busy doing your own stuff it's like running a race. You try not to look over your shoulder to see who else is in the race, you do the best you can. — Gene Simmons

I like to compete in a suit that will help me save me time and energy by reducing drag, so I race in Aqua Sphere's Energize Compression Speedsuit. The speedsuit also compresses the core muscles to damp vibration, which lessens muscle fatigue, leaving me fresher for the bike and run. — Timothy O'Donnell

I pledge to invest in women because I believe it offers one of the greatest returns on investment. I am committed to the belief that we would all be in a much better place if half the human race (women) were empowered to prosper, invent, be educated, start their own businesses, run for office essentially be given the chance to soar. — Sara Blakely

My dad was very successful running midgets in Texas. Then, his two drivers ran into some bad luck. People started saying that Daddy had lost his touch. That it was the cars and not the drivers. I wanted to race just to prove all those people wrong. — A. J. Foyt

Here Hillary Clinton is probably the most qualified person based on experience to ever run for president of the United States, and then this guy gets into the race, Bernie Sanders, and suddenly everybody goes, "Look at him. He's a real contender - " — Christy Clark

Every time my cameras go out on a movie, we learn something new and then we take what we learn and we put it into the next generation of the cameras so we're constantly improving. It's kind of like building a race car, racing it, then running back to the shop and working on the engine some more and tinkering with it to improve it. — James Cameron

If I performed poorly, I knew the eyes of the sports world would be turned away from me. In that situation I knew the NCAA would crush me for sure. But if I could run well, they would not dare to hit me with everyone looking in my direction. I HAD to have a good race. — Gerry Lindgren

The Greeks had a race in their Olympic games that was unique. The winner was not the runner who finished first. It was the runner who finished with his torch still lit. I want to run all the way with the flame of my torch still lit for Him. — Joseph Stowell

C. Every morning after that, the mice and the Littlepeople dressed in their running gear and headed over to Cheese Station C. It wasn't long before they each established their own routine. Sniff and Scurry continued to wake early every day and race through the Maze, always following the same route. When they arrived at their destination, the mice took off their running shoes, tied them together and hung them around their necks-so they could get to them quickly whenever they needed them again. Then they enjoyed the cheese. In the beginning Hem and Haw also raced toward Cheese Station C every morning to enjoy the tasty new morsels that awaited them. But after a while, a different routine set in for the Littlepeople. Hem and Haw awoke each day a little later, dressed a little slower, and walked to Cheese Station C. After all, they knew where the Cheese was — Spencer Johnson

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

The Tarahumara would party like this all night, then rouse themselves the next morning to face off in a running race that could last not two miles, not two hours, but two full days. According to the Mexican historian Francisco Almada, a Tarahumara champion once ran 435 miles, the equivalent of setting out for a jog in New York City and not stopping till you were closing in on Detroit. — Christopher McDougall

I love controlling a race, chewing up an opponent. Let's get down and dirty. Let's fight it out. It's raw, animalistic, with no one to rely on but yourself. There's no better feeling than that. — Adam Goucher

I may not drink an electrolyte beverage during the race. If I am running in an hour, I won't need one. But if you're running an hour-and-a-half to two hours or more, maybe you need a little bit of the electrolytes. — Ryan Hall

I raised you to be a thoroughbred. When thoroughbreds run, they wear blinders to keep their eyes focused straight ahead with no distractions, no other horses. They hear the crowd, but they don't listen. They just run their own race. That's what you have to do. Don't listen to anyone comparing you to me or to anyone else. You just run your own race. — Marlo Thomas

It's not really about the competition. Your biggest challenge in a race is yourself. You're often racing against time. You're frequently running everything through your mind. You're always competing against preconceived ideas. It's not really the person next to you that you worry about. — Summer Sanders

A Mafia guy in Vegas gave me this advice: 'Run your own race, put on your blinders.' — Joan Rivers

If you put down a good, solid foundation and build one room after another, pretty soon you have a house. You build in your speedwork, your pace and increase your ability to run races and think races out. Then it's possible to run the way we do. — Rod Dixon

There are always more questions. Science as a process is never complete. It is not a foot race, with a finish line ... People will always be waiting at a particular finish line: journalists with their cameras, impatient crowds eager to call the race, astounded to see the scientists approach, pass the mark, and keep running. It's a common misunderstanding, he said. They conclude there was no race. As long as we won't commit to knowing everything, the presumption is we know nothing. — Barbara Kingsolver

He who is running a race ought to endeavor and strive to the utmost of his ability to come off victor; but it is utterly wrong for him to trip up his competitor, or to push him aside. So in life it is not unfair for one to seek for himself what may accrue to his benefit; but it is not right to take it from another. — Chrysippus

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

Our feelings probably are not less strong at fifty than they were ten or fifteen years before; but they have changed their objects, and dwell on far different prospects. At five-and-thirty a man thinks of what his own existence is; when the maturity of age has grown into its autumn, he is wrapt up in that of others. The loss of wife or child then becomes more deplorable, as being impossible to repair; for no fresh connection can give us back the companion of our earlier years, nor a "new-sprung race" compensate for that, whose career we hoped to see run. — Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

The real purpose of running isn't to win a race, it's to test the limits of the human heart. — Bill Bowerman

The end result of all this consumption is a society running furiously to stay in place. The overwork by each member of society puts a burden (a negative externality) on others, who must also run hard to keep up. Consumers also run because others are running, with everybody finding themselves in a race they'd rather do without. The — Jeffrey D. Sachs

The photographer from the magazine, Masao Kageyama, would ride along in the van that accompanied me. He'd take pictures as they drove along. It wasn't a real race, and there weren't any water stations, so I'd occasionally stop to get water from the van. The Greek summer is truly brutal, and I knew I'd have to be careful not to get dehydrated.
"Mr. Murakami," Mr. Kageyama said, surprised as he saw me getting ready to run, "you're not really thinking of running the whole route, are you?"
"Of course I am. That's why I came here."
"Really? But when we do these kinds of projects most people don't go all the way. We just take some photos, and most of them don't finish the whole route. So you really are going to run the
entire thing?"
Sometimes the world baffles me. I can't believe that people would really do things like that. — Haruki Murakami

Being an American, what I've noticed is that we're in such a race. You wake up and you realize you're in the middle of a race, and some people are running right by you. — Steven Conrad

There are few instincts more natural than the body in full motion as it races across a field or through the trees. — Neal Bascomb

I want to run every race with a big heart. — Ryan Hall

It has been a wonderful experience to compete in the Olympic Games and to bring home a gold medal. But since I have been a young lad, I have had my eyes on a different prize. You see, each one of us is in a greater race than any I have run in Paris, and this race ends when God gives out the medals. — Eric Liddell

It was a very strange, disappointing race in that no one wanted to take it out. That's why I took the lead. I wanted some people to run the real distance and that was frustrating. So I took the pace around the second lap, which in some ways is suicidal ... but I wanted the pace to be honest. — Marla Runyan

You try too hard. Winners forget they're in a race. They just love to run. — Joe Pesci

There is no gaming table in the world where loaded dice are tolerated, no athletic field where men must not start fair. Yet Mr. Rockefeller has systematically played with loaded dice, and it is doubtful if there has ever been a time since 1872 when he has run a race with a competitor and started fair. — Ida Tarbell

Im running in a race and people are on the other track, I'm running with myself — Shahrukh Khan

I have to race because racing is a part of me. But I had to learn to race from a place of joy. Not pain. Not sorrow. Not anger. Not to fix things I can't control. But for a connection with other people. With the wilderness. With myself. — Erin Beresini

Running is not, as it so often seems, only about what you did in your last race or about how many miles you ran last week. It is, in a much more important way, about community, about appreciating all the miles run by other runners, too. — Richard O'Brien

It can't be more than a quarter of a mile to the finish, but it seems to go on forever. Do I really have to do this? My legs are entirely dead. Would it really matter if I stopped here?
But I know I'd regret it if I did, so I plod leadenly on, distracting myself...with the thought that, whatever troubles I may have been carrying around in my head before the race, I have now entirely forgotten what they were. This thought is rather refreshing. Whatever physical pains it has involved, this ordeal has utterly absorbed me, forcing my brain to focus on the kind of concerns for which it evolved - navigation, survival, balance, digging deep - rather than on the fretful urban anxieties to which it has become habituated. Reconnecting with your inner animal, I suppose you could call it; and it feels good. Especially when, blissfully, I catch sight of the finish. — Richard Askwith

It is difficult to imagine anyone having any real hopes for the human race in the face of the fact that the great majority of men still believe that the universe is run by a gaseous vertebrate of astronomical heft and girth, who is nevertheless interested in the minutest details of the private conduct of even the meanest man. — H.L. Mencken

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

Most of us feel on some level like race horses chomping at the bit, pressing at the gate, hoping and praying for someone to open the door and let us run out. We feel so much pent up energy, so much locked up talent. We know in our hearts that we were born to do great things, and we have a deep-seated dread of wasting our lives. But the only person who can free us is ourselves. Most of us know that. We realize that the locked door is our own fear. — Marianne Williamson

I am not a bloody ghoda running a race that you give me a tag. I am competitive, and the reason for that is that I want to do the best films. — Anushka Sharma

It's a little bit silly to pit us all against each other as if we were running a race. Just think about the fact that Richard Burton never won an Oscar. — Julianna Margulies

The metric system was designed to get people to enter charity runs.Do you think you would go run a 3.1 mile race? No, but if somebody says, hey, 5 km. You go, 5km sounds pretty impressive. — Greg Gutfeld

One day the factory sports coach, who was very strict, pointed at four boys, including me, and ordered us to run in a race. I protested that I was weak and not fit to run, but the coach sent me for a physical examination and the doctor said that I was perfectly well. So I had to run, and when I got started I felt I wanted to win. But I only came in second. That was the way it started. — Emil Zatopek

Throughout your career people will try to distract you. Some will scream at you, others will say things behind your back, and a few feral animals will literally try to throw their stiletto heel in in your lane and trip you. Keep your eyes straight ahead and just run your race. — Sharyn Alfonsi

Behind me are a hard 2 weeks of training, so I feel a little bit tired right now, but my goal for the race in Cardiff and Pau remains the same as in all races. I want to do well and have good runs and enjoy racing. The results come by itself when I do that. — Peter Kauzer

I think it went really well. There was part of me that really wanted to go with the rabbit. But, honestly one thing that I struggle with a lot is really just competing ... being in a pack, running with a lot of bodies. I'm 17 and I'm still not really used to it, so the goal today was to just race. — Mary Cain

If a country can only be rich by running a successful race for low wages, I should be disposed to say at once, perish such riches! — Thomas Malthus

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

A lot of people give up when the world seems to be against them, but that's the point when you should push a little harder. I use the analogy of running a race. It seems as though you can't carry on, but if you just get through the pain barrier, you'll see the end and be okay. Often, just around the corner is where the solution will happen. — James Dyson

Keep the Feast of the Resurrection. Be a Peter or a John; hasten to the Sepulchre, running together, running against one another, vying in the noble race (cf. Jn. 20:3-4). And even if you be beaten in speed, win the victory of zeal; not looking into the tomb, but going in. — Gregory Of Nazianzus

I realize this is blasphemy, but a few weeks ago I tried to watch a NASCAR race being run at Talladega. I lasted about five minutes before terminal boredom overtook me. It appeared to be nothing more than a high-speed freeway commute
a mob of luridly painted, identical lumps of metal loping at 180 mph around the banking, fender to fender, nose to tail. Knowing the scenario would surely devolve into a multicar demolition derby that would thrill the goobers in the grandstands, I turned off the set to later learn that this time it was Jimmie Johnson who triggered the eight-car melee. — Brock Yates

I came second in a 1,500-metre running race at school. I knew I couldn't have come first, so second was my version of first. — Chet Faker

A moment later the race began - poof - without any fanfare. There was no horn or gun or even a megaphone. But someone at the starting line must have yelled, "Go!" for everyone began running. Some things, even some of the most life-changing experiences, start that way. No one says, "This (fill in the blank) is going to be one of the most radical rites of passage you will ever travel through, so pay attention." Someone just says, "Okay, go ahead now," and you find yourself in the middle of an unexpected lightning storm with your life flashing before you. — Cami Ostman

White Hot Concentration is the unappreciated fruit of hard ligting, especially squats. When your in the squat rack, with a serious amount of weight overhead, your life literally depends on maintaining concentration. You learn to block out the swirling images in the mirror, the obnoxious chatter of the people next to you, the fat drop of sweat running down your nose. Once you've mastered this concentration in the weight room, duplicating it on the race course is relatively easy. Champions have only a few things in common. One weapon they all possess is White Hot Concentration. — Brad Alan Lewis

Running, close companion to death, summons us to the most vivid acts of life. Our ancestors (we have forgotten) ran for food and for love, love and lust. For us, a prime symbol of sexuality is the automobile. For the ancients it was the chase, the foot race. Satyr and nymph, maiden and god, hot pursuit. The mythic hunters, Diana and Atalanta, available only to the males, men or gods, who could outrun them; death to all others. — George Leonard

May is a very early time in the year and the weather is usually bad. You cannot run a fast mile race if there is a strong wind, because it makes your running uneven. — Roger Bannister

We are like highly trained athletes, who never run a race. — Paul Samuelson

In a long distance race, everyone gets tired. The winner is the runner who figures out where to put the tired, figures out how to store it away until after the race is over. Sure, he's tired. Everyone is. That's not the point. The point is to run. — Seth Godin

Equal pay is not yet equal. A woman makes 77 cents on a dollar and women of color make 67 cents ... We feel so passionately about this because we are not only running for office, but we each, in our own way, have lived it. We have seen it. We have understood the pain and the injustice that has come because of race, because of gender. And it's imperative that ... we make it very clear that each of us will address these issues. — Hillary Clinton

When people run a business and open their door to the public, they must serve the public. That doesn't mean they can't say whatever they want to say. It doesn't mean they can't believe whatever they want to believe. Those are protected also. But businesses must serve the public. And that's a principle that we fought for in this country over many, many decades, when some were invoking religious freedom as an excuse to deny people on the basis of their race, on the basis of their religion, on the basis of sex and on the basis now of sexual orientation. Let's not confuse one thing with the other. — Chris Christie

Don't follow the crowd. The crowd doesn't get there. They just run round and around in a crazy race. It never ends. — Frederick Lenz

We may train or peek for a certain race, but running is a lifetime sport. — Alberto Salazar

Poetry, music, forests, oceans, solitude
they were what developed enormous spiritual strength. I came to realize that spirit, as much or more than physical conditioning, had to be stored up before a race. — Herb Elliott

Wanting to win races is detrimental to courage. You tend to run too conservatively because you want to wait and sprint. If you are there to force the pace, to CREATE greatness rather than to have greatness, Courageous moves are a part of your race. — Gerry Lindgren

Sarah Palin has managed to use her failed vice presidential run to put herself in a position of power and influence. Joe Biden won the race and he hasn't been able to put himself in a position of power and influence. — Craig Ferguson

The natural urge when running a distance is to push harder and finish sooner - to race against time. Every second behind a deadline is a little defeat. — Joe Henderson

[Scientific testing] can't determine how the mind will tolerate pain in a race. Sometimes, I say, 'Today I can die.' — Gelindo Bordin

In the build-up to a race I begin practising two days beforehand with two other team members. We have an hour and a half practise run together. Then on the next day we have another practise in two separate hour long sessions. On the actual day of competition we do a warm-up run in the car before the race. — Liz Halliday

Like running the hurdles. Work so hard, jump over every one, fast, high enough but no higher, because you can't afford to hang in the air. And then, when the race is over, you're dripping with sweat, either they beat you or you beat them ... and then a couple of guys come out and move the hurdles out of the way. Turns out they were nothing. All that work to jump over them, but now they're gone. — Orson Scott Card

Each man is afraid of his neighbor's disapproval - a thing which, to the general run of the human race, is more dreaded than wolves and death. — Mark Twain

Then I take a dump. Feel better. Take off my clothes and step into the pool. Ice water. But great. I walk along toward the deep end of the pool, the water rising inch by inch, chilling me. Then I plunge below the water. It's restful. The world doesn't know where I am. I come up, swim to the far edge, find the ledge, sit there. It must be about the 9th or 10th race. The horses are still running. I plunge again into the water, being aware of my stupid whiteness, of my age hanging onto me like a leech. Still, it's OK. I should have been dead 40 years ago. I rise to the top, swim to the far edge, get out. — Charles Bukowski

I am in Rome! Oft as the morning ray Visits these eyes, waking at once I cry, Whence this excess of joy? What has befallen me? And from within a thrilling voice replies, Thou art in Rome! A thousand busy thoughts Rush on my mind, a thousand images; And I spring up as girt to run a race! — Samuel Rogers

Running is a simple, primitive act, and therein lays its power. For it is one of the few commonalities left between us as a human race. — Dean Karnazes

In Haida's brain there must have been a kind of high-speed circuit built to match the pace of his thoughts, requiring him to occasionally engage his gears, to let his mind race for fixed periods of time. If he didn't - if he kept on running in low gear to keep pace with Tsukuru's reduced speed - Haida's mental infrastructure would overheat and start to malfunction. Or at least, Tsukuru got that impression. — Haruki Murakami

And each forgets, as he strips and runs With a brilliant, fitful pace, It's the steady, quiet, plodding ones Who win in the lifelong race. And each forgets that his youth has fled, Forgets that his prime is past, Till he stands one day, with a hope that's dead, In the glare of the truth at last. — Robert W. Service

At least in a race you have mile markers and know how long you have to go. Labor is like running as hard as you can without knowing where the finish line is. — Lorraine Moller

We ran well there in the November 2012, my first race with (Tony) Gibson (as crew chief). Unfortunately, we haven't left there without a torn up race car. We got caught up in accidents in November of 2012 and then again in November 2013. We cut a tire and crashed last spring, so it'd be nice to have a good clean run with the GoDaddy car. I like Phoenix and Gibson has won there a few times. Hopefully our luck will turn around and we can have a good smooth run and get back on track. — Danica Patrick

No matter how old I get, the race remains one of life's most rewarding experiences. My times become slower and slower, but the experience of the race is unchanged: each race a drama, each race a challenge, each race stretching me in one way or another, and each race telling me more about myself and others. — George A. Sheehan

It was a race he was running now, a race between his rent money and ... he did not know the name of the other contestant. Perhaps it was every man whom he passed on the street. — Ayn Rand

As a sportsman, I accept being beaten. Everybody tries to be a winner, but only one in a race will win. It's fun to win. But I don't find unhappiness if I lose. — Kipchoge Keino

There's one rule of thumb that suggests that you need one day of recovery for every mile run in a race. Another rule of thumb ... suggests one day ... for every kilometer run in anger. — Hal Higdon

When runners win a big race these days, they get a car. When I won a big race, I got a ride. — Ron Delany

When you run a race, you hurt your ability to compete when you turn your head to look at the competition chasing you, you lose a step physically and psychologically. Run the race always stretching to do your best, imitations will come in last, no one can catch an original. — Oprah Winfrey

How you run the race - your planning, preparation, practice, and performance - counts for everything. Winning or losing is a by-product, and aftereffect, of that effort. — John Wooden

Running back-to-back races requires a certain tactical prudence. Going too hard in any one race might jeopardize your performance in another. Maintaining proper hydration and caloric equilibrium also becomes increasingly critical. — Dean Karnazes

Of course with John McCain out of the race, George W. Bush has to pick a running mate. Which is kind of a scary proposition when you think about it. I mean his dad picked Dan Quayle, an he isn't as smart as his dad. — Jay Leno

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

On the seventh day of Passover, the curtain finally rose: the Germans arrested the leaders of the Jewish community. From that moment on, everything happened very quickly. The race toward death had begun. First edict: Jews were prohibited from leaving their residences for three days, under penalty of death. Moishe the Beadle came running to our house. "I warned you," he shouted. And left without waiting for a response. The same day, the Hungarian police — Elie Wiesel

I was unable to walk for a whole week after that, so much did the race take out of me. But it was the most pleasant exhaustion I have ever known. — Emil Zatopek

I started running track when I was 13 years old, as a freshman in high school. I ran the 400 meters, which is a very tough race and a full sprint. — Norah O'Donnell

You have to know this: running a 100m race is an intense experience. You have a lot of emotion at the end of the race. It is not easy to control that when you win. — Maurice Greene

Do not be lazy. Run each day's race with all your might, so that at the end you will receive the victory wreath from God. Keep on running even when you have had a fall. The victory wreath is won by him who does not stay down, but always gets up again, grasps the banner of faith and keeps on running in the assurance that Jesus is Victor. — Basilea Schlink

My thoughts before a big race are usually pretty simple. I tell myself: Get out of the blocks, run your race, stay relaxed. If you run your race, you'll win ... channel your energy. Focus. — Carl Lewis