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LIST OF MY FAVORITE
RUNNING QUOTES
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The Best Running Quotes (don't always come from runners ...)
At least some of the most motivating quotes come from folks who are not runners. One of the things that has amazed me as I gather quotes for the printing of each year's running log is just how many I choose from non-runners. By far some of my favorite quotes actually come from poets and politicians, like Shakespeare or Sir Winston Churchill, comedians like Milton Berle and theologians like C.S. Lewis (of Narnia fame). Other great quotes that have application for runner's come from cartoonists like Charles Schultz and Scott Adams (Dilbert). Consider Erma Bombeck's thoughts on the benefits of running:
"I'd take up jogging just to hear the sound of heavy
breathing again."
Why is this? The occasional good quote from a runner usually comes from the more seasoned runner or one who has had some significant life experience beyond the mere fact of being a record-setting athlete. The truly uplifting quotes come from men and women of the sport who have experienced deep loss, engaged in selfless service, or overcome real obstacles. The humorous quotes are often among the best because they reveal a runner who has gained the capacity to poke fun at one's self--an ability only attained with maturity.
Quotes I routinely reject are the ones that comment about nothing more than the raw act of running, the speed, the macho do-or-die stuff. Why? Because such drivel is self-absorbed and so shallow you can't even wet your tongue let alone bathe your soul in it.
The best quotes come from those runners for whom running isn't everything. For such folk running is just one of their chosen ways for living out a joyous and disciplined life and a host of other related virtues. It may be the dominant means of their self-expression, but not the sole means. The unintelligible enya-esque approach to imputing circular, mystical meaning to running, saying inane things like, "I run to become the person I already am," requires a shorter interval of real thought than a 400 meter repeat.
Moreover, the best runners are those who are excellent at other pursuits (and many, in fact, are). The majority of runners who seem to get quoted, like so many celebrities, having lightening fast performances but much slower wit. What, after all, can one really do with such samplings as are easily found on the web, like:
"Run hard, be strong, think big."
Or:
"Somewhere in the world someone is running when
you are not. When you race him, he will win."
Think this one through for a moment. What is it really saying besides the obvious fact that while it is dark on our side of the planet it is daylight elsewhere and someone is running in a time-frame appropriate to their time zone? Does anyone seriously believe you must be running 24/7 in order to beat your competition in Tanzania, as this quote suggests?
Here's another stupid one:
"Pain is just weakness leaving the body."
Ooooh! IF one takes seriously the suggestion to ignore pain and just run through it, a stress fracture or other injury is not far down the road waiting to replace the pain that is leaving! Not even George Sheehan, medical doctor and running guru, suggests ignoring pain.
By contrast, consider this quip by Duncan MacDonald, the accomplished marathoner and medical doctor, which takes note of the fact that success depends on the ability to make choices between the worthwhile and the wasteful, a skill that applies as well to running as to life:
Someone came up to Duncan MacDonald and said:
"I saw you on television and read about you in the news-
papers. How do you do it?" MacDonald replied, "I don't
watch television and I don't read the papers."
The point is this: Don't let running alone define who you are ... ever! Define your running by who you are. That way if some freak accident, prolonged injury, bad knees or whatever, were to take your running away from you, you will still have a real identity to fall back on ... a self that has been cultivated through a wide range of interests and passions. Like my friend, for whom advancing arthritis is slowly taking away his ability to run, who nonetheless still knows who he is. If running alone is all that defines you it will diminish you. On the other hand, if you compete to bring kindness and community and real depth of character to the sport (along with your gutsiest performance) you will benefit not only yourself but everyone who runs with you. And you might, from time to time, utter some ironic or humorous remark -- a real gem of wit -- that will end up being quoted somewhere by someone ... maybe even in a future edition of a famous running log.
You can quote me on that!
Neil Culbertson, former GRC Prez
January 2004