Here’s an embarrassing story for you: When I was in fourth grade, we had a project at school where we were to illustrate our own short story which would be “published” aka, bound and laminated, by our teacher. Drawing and writing was something that came naturally to me and when my little book came together, I was pretty pleased with myself, so much so that I thought it was probably the best in our class. Until, that is, I saw my classmate Ryah’s book. Her drawings were better, the pattern of the cover binding was cooler and I feel like I remember overhearing chatter amongst the other students and even our teacher, seemingly overtaken by how awesome Ryah’s book was.
Suddenly, my book no longer felt amazing, or special and definitely not the best and it hurt. So I handled that feeling in the only logical way you would and while everyone was out at recess, I procured a giant black sharpie and scribbled across a few pages. The students returned from recess, my crime was discovered, tears were shed. Expressions of awe were replaced by questions “Who would do this?”. I felt bad, I felt shame. Shame over the actions I had chosen and the disregard for my poor classmate’s feelings. Even more shame over the overwhelming feelings of jealousy, inadequacy, entitlement and pure rage that had led me to those actions. Shame that I could not establish and ground my sense of self, my sense of accomplishment. Shame that the pure circumstance of someone else subjectively being “better than me” crumbled it all. Ryah, if you are somehow reading this, I’m super sorry for being such a little shit, your book really did rock.
Obviously, a few decades later, I have developed the self-control to not sharpie other people’s shit when I get upset. Nonetheless, the act of comparison, the feelings of hurt and inadequacy that follow and the shame of even feeling those feelings in the first place is, at times, relentless. This is a particularly unproductive thought pattern when you are someone that also loves to engage in the sport of running and, in turn racing.
As a running coach myself – what kind example do I want to be for the athletes I coach and what advice would I give them if I knew they shared similar insecurities? We all know that the act of comparison is often the thief of joy, but why is it such a difficult behavior to resist? Probably because sometimes indulging in results comparison can make us feel really good. Winning a race, or placing in your age group, or finishing in the top X% of finishers, or even just completing a race itself is something that we do and should celebrate. Where we run into trouble, I think, is when we start to depend on these results to serve as a measuring stick as to whether we succeeded or not.
When you try your best at something and fail, it hurts. For me, when this happens, these little failures often spread like weeds into a full-blown narrative in my brain that leaves me telling myself that I will fail again.
You can’t do this.
When someone else accomplishes what I so badly want to, seemingly easily, it reinforces that narrative.
You can’t do this and you should be able to because other people can.
Look how easy it is for other people.
Why is it so hard for you?
There’s something wrong with you.
You.Aren’t.Good.Enough.
This has been a particular challenge I’ve had to work through in chasing my goal of running the marathon under 3 hours for the last few years. Many other women have and will bust that 3 hour barrier. Sometimes it just feels so embarrassing that I’ve both put the goal out there and failed several times when I’ve seen and been amazed by other women (and men) who nail it on their first try or even “by accident”. It’s not that I’m not happy for and proud of them, but sometimes watching others succeed serves as fuel for the narrative in my head that says: you’re not good enough to even chase this goal.
My mindset really changed a few weeks ago when I listened to an episode of the Trail Running Women Podcast, featuring Steph McGregor as a guest to talk about her journey as a runner, culminating most recently with her running a 2:57 at the Chicago Marathon. I’ve followed Steph for years on instagram and even had the pleasure of running with her on a trip to Vancouver once. I remember years ago watching her chase her goal of a sub 1 hr 30min half marathon and eventually a sub 3 marathon. (Spoiler alert, she has now blown both goals out of the water). She’s someone who has always been vulnerable about putting her goals out there and also sharing when she falls short, but she had never gotten into the nitty gritty on how she worked her way down to under 3 hours in the marathon until this podcast. Yes, Steph has always impressed me with her speed but what really had me mesmerized during this episode is how relatable all of her “failures” were. She ran an impressive 3:00:22 at CIM in 2021 but it still took her another few attempts to finally break the barrier and absolutely smash it in Chicago last year – her times, in fact, got further away from her goal before they got closer. She spoke a lot about her lack of belief in herself and how on a few of her attempts, she felt herself give up on herself during the race. This felt so relatable to me to see another female athlete who I hold in such high regard experience and push through “failure”. Listening to Steph talk about going sub 3 didn’t reinforce my fear that I cant, it actually made me feel like I can get there too. Not because I’m necessarily fast like Steph, but because I won’t give up, but she figured out how to fully believe in herself and I know I can figure that out too.
Last Week’s Training (~75km total, ~6hrs total)
Monday – full REST day
Tuesday – 4 x 2km @ Half Marathon Pace, 3min recovery jog (~14km)
Wednesday – Dawn Patrol! (8.5km easy)
Thursday – 16 x 400m, 40s rest (~12km)
Friday – 30 minutes easy indoor cycle
Saturday – 3 x 7km @ 4:35/km, 4:22/km, 4:09/km. The goal was 90%/95%/100% Goal Marathon Pace. I got to do this at sea level and on bare pavement which was a real treat (30km)
Sunday – 10km easy (felt like a death march TBH
Anyway; since I’ve already gone way over my 45 minutes of writing, and in the spirit of non-comparison; here’s a (non-exhaustive) list of women who have inspired me in some way in their quests for sub 3:
First and foremost: Alex Harriss (I don’t even need to explain this one, there is no one I believe in more of being capable of sub 3 and when she gets the right opportunity, there is not a shadow of a doubt in my mind she will utterly BUST that time)
Alissa Kolarik – I don’t know her but have been an insta fan since I found her profile after we both ran Boston in 2021. Similarly to Steph, she is relentless in pursuing her sub-3 goals with vulnerability and I have probably never rooted so hard for a stranger as I do for her.
Tory Scholz – She mentioned that a sub 3 hour marathon “was just a badass accomplishment for a woman” on the TrailRunningWomen podcast literally years ago and her words have stuck in my head ever since
Alison McPherson – smoked sub 3 on her first try after having a broken leg just several months earlier
Mercedes Vince – also smoked a sub 3 AT BOSTON (notoriously tough course) 9 days after running (winning) Diez Vista 50km
This one time I went running 