The finish line...

After I finished the race Saturday, I had the opportunity to sit in the stadium and watch others finish. That was pretty neat. One thing that struck me as I watched was the different running styles was that the finish line doesn’t care how beautiful your stride is or how skinny your waist is. Before I started running, I would have thought that all people in races were bean poles with perfect gaits and long strides. After running for almost a year, I realized that there are runners of every body type, gait and speed. I learned to never judge a book by its cover when trying to project finishing times at the start of a race. I have been passed by knock kneed women, bow legged men, foot shuffling senior citizens and gazelle like teenagers.

Once we cross the finish line, we are all equals. The times may be different, but the results are not. We all asked our bodies to do something that takes as much mental toughness as it does physical strength. We all started out on the same side of the starting line and we all ended up on the same side of the finish line. My coach, Allan, put it this way last Saturday as we were waiting for the start and a girl in front of us heard us talking about our ‘goal times’.... Allan told me his goal for the marathon and she turned around and said “I’m just hoping to finish in 6 hours!”. Allan replied, “I promise you that the medal you get will look exactly like the one I get...”. He was right, the finish line looks the same to all of us and that is the beauty of running. Sure there is some competition, but the biggest competition is with yourself.