Watching your friends succeed

Best thing ever

On the road

This week I am on the road and out of the country. That means I have a less than reliable internet connection and my time for writing I limited. I wrote a good chunk of this article on the train using my phone, but unfortunately the app failed and deleted it all when I tried adding a photo. Even though the universe seems to be against me writing an article this week, I am determined to get it done.

Guess where I am

I was a bit up in the air about what to write about this week (especially due to my full travel schedule), but last weekend something happened and provided a bit of inspiration for my writing.

The Beast of the East

Last year I ran an the Nobeyama Ultramarathon in Nagano Prefecture. This ultramarathon is a 100 km road run around the Yatsugatake Highland area. As road ultramarathons go, it has a reputation for being one of the toughest in the region, and has even been dubbed the 東の横綱 (Higashi no Yokozuna: The Yokozuna of the East). Yokozuna is the highest rank you can get in sumo wrestling, but this is essentially a very Japanese way of calling it, “the best of the east.”

Some Nobeyama hightlights from last year

I did not run the Nobeyama Ultramarathon this year. I am in the process of preparing for another ultramarathon in the same series called the 飛騨高山ウルトラマラソン (Hida Takayama Ultramarathon), which is another 100 km race taking place in June in Gifu. But because I am a Nobeyama veteran I have knowledge about the course and as a result I sometimes have people asking me questions about it.

Ambitious running friends

People who follow my blog know that I quite regularly engage with beach sprinting. A big group of us go down to the beach every week and sprint up and down on the sand to build both speed and endurance. We run 200 meters at a time, which means we end up with a big mix of people running, from elite runners that make me look slow to weekend warriors who have this as their only running session of the week.

Leading up to the Nobeyama Ultramarathon, one of my friends started asking me more and more questions about the ultra. His marathon time is about 5 hours (he may have only run one marathon), but he told me that he had entered the Nobeyama marathon as not only his first ultramarathon, but his first 100 km attempt.

YOU’VE DONE WHAT?!

I was quite impressed that someone who has little long distance running experience would not only jump from marathon to 100K, but also that he chose pretty much the toughest road 100K in the region for the attempt. But being impressed was also mixed with a little concern, because I know from experience how hard the race is.

Over the next few weeks we met at the beach sprinting events and I gave the advice that I could about the race. Most of that information came in the form of:

• Don’t walk any of the downhill sections

• Pace yourself on the uphill sections (run where you can but don’t tire yourself out)

• Drink more water than you think you need at the aid stations (drink until you think you’ve had enough, then drink a little more)

• Focus on making the checkpoint cut-offs, not the overall race cut off

• Study the course in detail

• Have fun

I also shared the articles I wrote about the race, including the article that described the course in detail, and my final race report on the course.

My friend was understandably a little bit nervous having spoken to me (and others) and getting the, “You entered the hardest ultra in the region as your first ultra?!” reaction, but no matter what the result would be, the attitude of, “in great attempts, it is glorious even to fail,” remains true.

Bruce Lee quote

Monitoring the situation

The race took place on Saturday. Over the day I was keeping an eye out for news about the ultra. It seemed like it was a bit of a hot one and I received news about people dropping out of the race.

But at about 7PM I received a message from my friend.

Good news!

As you can see from the picture, he has a race medal. The message from him was:

“I completed the ultramarathon without incident. Thank you very much for your advice.”

I responded with, “WONDERFUL! CONRATULATIONS! ULTRARUNNER!”

This was obviously the best result I could have hoped for in the race. My friend went from a 5 hour marathon runner, to a Nobeyama 100 km veteran.

This would be a massive achievement for any ultrarunner, but to go from essentially a beginner with no experience of that distance to finishing the toughest road ultra in the region is incredible.

You’ll never know your potential unless you push yourself

I am of the opinion that most people could run a marathon. They just don’t because they set a standard for themselves that is too high, and as a result never even try. They think they will need to run at full speed for the full 42.195 km. I have run many marathons now and even I don’t run at “full speed” for the full distance. I find my marathon pace and run at that.

No matter what you do, actually putting yourself out there and attempting something is the most important step. I wasn’t sure I could run a marathon when I first ran one. But I ran it and I finished it. Same with my first ultra. (My first ultra was a 70K). Back then I didn’t have anyone to talk to about whether I could or couldn’t do something. I just did it. And I succeeded.

Sometimes talking to people can be a bit of a double-edged sword. Especially if they make judgements about what you can do based on what you’ve done so far. Before my first marathon, the longest distance I’d ever run before that was a half marathon. Maybe a more experienced runner would have been nervous about me trying a full marathon if they knew my personal best race distance was just under 22 km. But getting out there and trying is where we find the limits of our potential. Or in both my case and my friends case, find that we were able to complete our goals and as such, have yet to have found the limits of our potential.

Final thoughts and take home messages

I am always very happy to see people do well. I am even happier if something I’ve said, written, or done helps people to achieve whatever goals they have set out to achieve. So I was over the moon when my friend took time out of his day to send me a picture of him at the finish line to thank me for helping him achieve his goal.

If you have something you want to achieve, go out and give it a go. That’s how you get it done. People who have done it before would likely love to help where they can and give you advice, but they can’t achieve the thing for you.

Nobody can climb those mountains for you. And nobody can tell you that you can’t climb those mountains based on your previous achievements. Sometimes you only need one attempt to get it done and discover that at the top of the mountain, you discover more of your potential.

---

Thank you very much for reading. If you enjoy my work please share it with someone you think would also enjoy it.

If you aren’t subscribed, please sign up to keep up to date.　

If social media is more your thing I’m active on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

And if you are feeling generous but don’t want to commit to a monthly subscription, you can send a small donation to my Buy me a coffee page below.

Osu!