Marathon Running Quotes

In an era when man can no longer dash out of his cave and slay a mammoth, he simply slips on his Lycra and goes for a run. ~ Phil Hewitt

And then there's the perverse joy of subtly working in references to marathon training in daily life, say at the post office or while waiting outside my first-graders' classrooms at the end of the school day. ~ Sarah Bowen Shea

Remember, it's the pace that kills, never the distance. ~ Bill Jones

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

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

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

For every runner who tours the world running marathons, there are thousands who run to hear the leaves and listen to the rain, and look to the day when it is suddenly as easy as a bird in flight. ~ George Sheehan

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

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

You shall become the person you are. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

No drugs here, no manipulation of neurotransmitters that leaves our worldly problems unattended. And no talking cures because explicit insight is not needed. All that is required is courage: the courage to encounter discomfort and stay with it long enough to be changed by it, strengthened. ~ Jason Dias

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

One of the great discoveries of marathon running for the masses is that you run against no one but yourself. ~ Phil Hewitt

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

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

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

Marathon running, for me, was the most controlled test of mettle that I could ever think of. It's you against Darwin. ~ Ryan Reynolds

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

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

It's kind of like a midlife crisis kind of thing. When you turn 40, you have to run the marathon, while all the parts still work properly. ~ Joe Bastianich

When I go to the Boston Marathon now, I have wet shoulders - women fall into my arms crying. They're weeping for joy because running has changed their lives. They feel they can do anything. ~ Kathrine Switzer

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

The marathon's about being in contention over the last 10K. That's when it's about what you have in your core. You have run all the strength, all the superficial fitness out of yourself, and it really comes down to what's left inside you. To be able to draw deep and pull something out of yourself is one of the most tremendous things about the marathon. ~ Robert De Castella

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

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

The Existentially Preoccupied Long Distance Runner

Sometimes I like to run so hard and for so long
with each mile I can feel the pain of my own awareness,
my own heightened consciousness of what ails me,
the ills of the world,
the limitations of our existence,
the losses we must endure,
the superficial interactions.

Sometimes I like to run so hard and for so long
that I can feel all of these feelings seep out of the pours of my own skin,
the sweat cleansing my very being,
my awareness of beauty heightened,
the experience of joy possible,
each mile, each minute, ridding me of these feelings,
washing away the illusions,
showing me the truth.

Sometimes I like to run so hard and for so long…
until finally I feel free…
until finally I AM free… ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

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

Yesterday was the New York City Marathon. Republicans won in a landslide. ~ David Letterman

When you run the marathon, you run against the distance, not against the other runners and not against the time. ~ Haile Gebrselassie

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

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

But I also realize that winning doesn't always mean getting first place; it means getting the best out of yourself. ~ Meb Keflezighi

The running boy is inside every man, no matter how old he gets. ~ Mitch Albom

Many of you have asked why it's taken me so long to select a running mate. I have no intention of reaching into the political grab bag and grabbing any man to be my running mate. I'm going to reach in and grab a woman! ~ Pat Paulsen

A few months ago on a school morning, as I attempted to etch a straight midline part on the back of my wiggling daughter's soon-to-be-ponytailed blond head, I reminded her that it was chilly outside and she needed to grab a sweater.

"No, mama."

"Excuse me?"

"No, I don't want to wear that sweater, it makes me look fat."

"What?!" My comb clattered to the bathroom floor. "Fat?! What do you know about fat? You're 5 years old! You are definitely not fat. God made you just right. Now get your sweater."

She scampered off, and I wearily leaned against the counter and let out a long, sad sigh. It has begun. I thought I had a few more years before my twin daughters picked up the modern day f-word. I have admittedly had my own seasons of unwarranted, psychotic Slim-Fasting and have looked erroneously to the scale to give me a measurement of myself. But these departures from my character were in my 20s, before the balancing hand of motherhood met the grounding grip of running. Once I learned what it meant to push myself, I lost all taste for depriving myself. I want to grow into more of a woman, not find ways to whittle myself down to less.

The way I see it, the only way to run counter to our toxic image-centric society is to literally run by example. I can't tell my daughters that beauty is an incidental side effect of living your passion rather than an adherence to socially prescribed standards. I can't tell my son how t ~ Kristin Armstrong

The time has passed in America when this party can be the party of compassion and let the executive branch run foreign policy. It won't work. We have to be the party that can stand toe to toe with George W. Bush on national security, as well as the party of compassion. ~ Wesley Clark

I love you," he said, holding her close and running his fingers through her tangled hair as if he couldn't believe she was still in his arms. "I think you've cast a spell on me, wicked witch that you are."
Baba thought that if this is what it meant to be wicked, she was all for it. ~ Deborah Blake

When we sit thoughtfully pondering in a quiet place and the Spirit speaks to us, there will come into our hearts and souls the things that are truly our greatest desires, those things that are more important in the long run than anything else. Away from the appeal of the world, that greatest desire usually relates to relationships with family and with the Lord. And when that priority is in place, then we begin to plan our lives with purpose. We begin to have goals that cause us to live with anticipation. ~ Ardeth Kapp

GATHERING LEAVES
Spades take up leaves
No better than spoons,
And bags full of leaves
Are light as balloons.
I make a great noise
Of rustling all day
Like rabbit and deer
Running away.
But the mountains I raise
Elude my embrace,
Flowing over my arms
And into my face.
I may load and unload
Again and again
Till I fill the whole shed,
And what have I then?
Next to nothing for weight,
And since they grew duller
From contact with earth,
Next to nothing for color.
Next to nothing for use.
But a crop is a crop,
And who's to say where
The harvest shall stop? ~ Robert Frost

If I were running the world I would have it rain only between 2 and 5 a.m. Anyone who was out then ought to get wet. ~ William Lyon Phelps

Train at the same pace day after day, week after week, year after year, and that's the kind of running the body adapts to. But break out of that comfort zone with a little speedwork now and then, and the body will learn to deal with the new demands. ~ Don Kardong

I was an athlete growing up. I did a lot of sports: soccer, basketball, so I was always so used to hardcore training, a lot of running. I got to a point where I felt like I just wanted to get toned; I didn't need to shed pounds, so now I do Pilates. ~ Jacquelyn Jablonski

Since in the long run deception is likely to be found out, your character had better not only seem good, but be it. ~ F.L. Lucas

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

My priorities now a a musician are so different now than they were as a kid. Everyone wants to be a rock star, and I wanted that too; I wanted to be on magazines and be running around the world and having all the fun. ~ Blake Judd

I'm sick of running away from things. ~ Natalia Kills

Poetry should be written the way adultery is committed: on the run, on the sly, during the time not accounted for. And then you come home, as if nothing ever happened, ~ Vera Pavlova

Run," he whispered. "Run."
"No, Rand," I said, brushing the dirt from his face. "I'm tired of running."
"Forgive me, please." He clutched my hand as his eyes beseeched me through tears of pain.
"You're forgiven."
He sighed once, then stopped breathing. The shine in his brown eyes dulled. I pulled his hood over his head. ~ Maria V. Snyder

Absence does not so much make the heart grow fonder as give the heart time to integrate what it has not previously absorbed, time to make sense of what happened too quickly to have any meaning in the instant. This is always true. If it is in absence that people forget each other, it is also in the quiet pause of absence that, minds running in symmetry, people come to know each other; there is sometimes as much intimacy in the span of continents as in the shared hours before dawn. ~ Andrew Solomon

The next time I found myself behind a woman running alone, I thought, I would do what I wished men had done for me: I would announce myself. 'Passing on your right!' I'd call. I would be careful to give her a wide berth. I would be aware that my body was, for much of the world, a weapon until proven otherwise. People sometimes think that being trans means I live 'between' worlds, but that's not exactly true. If anything, it has just created within me a potential for empathy that I must work every day, like a muscle, to grow. ~ Thomas Page McBee

Imagine if you had baseball cards that showed all the performance stats for your people: batting averages, home runs, errors, ERAs, win/loss records. You could see what they did well and poorly and call on the right people to play the right positions in a very transparent way. ~ Ray Dalio

No matter your title, people will not follow you if they don't trust you. ~ John C. Maxwell

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 thought I was bulletproof or Superman there for a while. I thought I'd never run out of nerve. Never. ~ Evel Knievel

My attraction to story is a ceaseless current that runs through the center of me. My inexhaustible ardor for reading seems connected to my hunger for storylines that show up in both books and in the great tumbling chaos of life. ~ Pat Conroy

The generations before you failed. They didn't stay up all night. They got distracted and lost sight of the fact that life is a miracle every moment of your existence. Nature beckons you to be on her side. You couldn't ask for a better boss. The most unrealistic person in the world is the cynic, not the dreamer. Hope only makes sense when it doesn't make sense to be hopeful. This is your century. Take it and run as if your life depends on it. ~ Paul Hawken

People, at least a few like me, have this weird tendency of running away from things when they are their own, and racing after them obsessively when they are gone. ~ Mita Jain

She's easy to use." Laszlo pointed at the doll's neck. "You remove the clamp, insert the small funnel, select two quarts of your favorite blood from Romatech Industries, and fill her up."
I see. Does she light up when she's running low?"
Laszlo frowned. "I suppose I could put in an indicator light- ~ Kerrelyn Sparks

Relationship is a pervading and changing mystery ... brutal or lovely, the mystery waits for people wherever they go, whatever extreme they run to. ~ Eudora Welty

The banking institutions, my friends, are sailing under false colours. They are running with the hare and hunting with the hounds. And we should never forget it. ~ Karl Wiggins

You can't rush the miles. No matter how fast I run, the five miles isn't going to be done in the first five minutes. ~ Robert Herjavec

As an occupation in declining years, I declare I think saving is useful, amusing and not unbecoming. It must be a perpetual amusement. It is a game that can be played by day, by night, at home and abroad, and at which you must win in the long run ... What an interest it imparts to life!. ~ William Makepeace Thackeray

A government run by billionaires for billionaires is an affront to freedom, morality, and humanity. ~ Michael Moore