Sixteen weeks. That’s how long I poured myself into preparing for this marathon. Early mornings. Double-digit runs before most people were awake. Speed sessions when my legs felt like concrete. Long runs in the heat, the wind, and the days when motivation was hiding under the covers.

Some days were magic, the pace felt effortless, the road flew by. Other days were the exact opposite, a grind that tested my patience and my will. But the beauty of training is that both kinds of days count. The highs give you confidence. The lows build the grit you’ll need when things get messy.

I have prepared for a number of races at this point in my life over the last 5 years. I’ve come to appreciate the beauty of each prep, for its highs and its lows. The old cliché of “it’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey.” And I do believe that. You become who you are working to be in the lab, not on the on the performance day. We all know that deep down at this point, but we (including me) would still be lying if we ignored that small part of us that wants to prove out in the open that it was all worth it. To accomplish what we set out for.

Race day. The first few miles were exactly what we’d hoped for - calm, controlled, and patient. We had worked with a coach who had laid out the following plan for us:

• Mile 1 - 5: This is just a warmup for the race. Settle in behind the pace group, just a few seconds behind your ideal pace (somewhere in the 6:50 - 6:55 range). Do not go out too fast

• Mile 5 - 15: This is the cruise control zone, no pun intended. Settle right into marathon pace, right around 6:50. Take down a large chunk of this race comfortably, so we can afford to race the back half

• Mile 15 - 18: Check in with the body, if it feels good, pick the pace up

• Mile 18 - 21: This is the wall - switch the mindset to “go catch people” who had gone out too fast and were coming back

• Mile 21 - 26: Race your race. Go get whatever time you can

By mile five, I had settled into a rhythm that felt sustainable. I wasn’t chasing the clock; I was running my race, just really trying to zone out on the surroundings, and the 3:00 pacer lightly bounding down the track with what felt like minimal effort.

At mile 15, the first cracks appeared. My legs whispered, This might hurt today. But I reminded myself, every race has this moment. Stay locked in. Get one more mile.

Then something shifted around mile 18. I found another little gear. Miles 18 to 21 were pure flow. The calm of the trail, the rhythm of my breathing, the pounding of my shoes - it all clicked. I started to believe this was going to be one of those rare, almost-perfect days. We were averaging right under 6:47 minutes per mile.

Until it wasn’t.

By just before mile 23, the fatigue started to bite deeper. I was still moving well, but the effort was creeping up, and the pace had slowed. Then at mile 25 one mile from the finish - it happened. I went from feeling subtly off to my right knee buckling every time I landed on it. My body gave out. I collapsed. I don’t remember much, but I later came to find out that I was experiencing rhabdomyolysis.

I had only previously heard of rhabdo in a David Goggins book, where he experienced it at mile 215 of a 250 mile race. I never really considered it a threat for someone like myself at the marathon distance. For those of you who aren’t familiar with rhabdo (I am only recently educated), as you overexert your muscles, they begin to breakdown. When they reach a certain point/rate of breaking down, proteins are released into the blood stream. These proteins can be toxic at a high level, and begin to impair your organ functions. Bad cases are…well, the worst option.

For a reference - A normal male’s creatinine kinase levels are 25-150 U/L. When my blood was drawn at the hospital, my results came back at 1,150 U/L. Scary stuff.

Onto Perspective

Laying there in some thicket of weeds off the side of the trail, unable to will my legs to move, I felt extremely small. But I never want to forget what I thought about as I did lay there. Because a mile from the finish line, after 16 weeks of training, I didn’t think about the race at all. I thought about Allison. I thought about my family. I thought about how trivial it would be to kick the bucket on a race, taking all of the David Goggins preaching to the absolute edge. I thought about the bigger picture - my health, my family, and what really mattered.

That moment was humbling.

This is the truth about chasing big goals. To achieve something extraordinary, you have to push the limits. You have to step right up to the edge of what you think you’re capable of, and sometimes, without realizing it, you step a little too far.

This is the razor’s edge that endurance sports, and life, live on. The growth is in the discomfort, but so is the danger. It’s a delicate balance. Push too little, and you never find out what you’re made of. Push too much, and you risk more than the goal is worth.

I will be 100% honest with you all. I am only beginning to wrap my mind around this weekend and process the emotions from it. I am of course disappointed. Who wouldn’t be. I am still proud of the training. I don’t really know how to properly wrap my head around the time spent waiting for the EMTs and what to take from that experience. I don’t really have the ability to even start thinking about what this means for what’s next.

But the answer is I don’t have to. I’m going to take another step today to get my body better than it was yesterday. And I’ll do the same tomorrow. And then I’ll take another step back into the gym here soon, and we’ll rebuild back up. I set goals - it’s in my DNA - and I will return to my roots shortly. But I am sure this next phase will look a little different?

I didn’t get the finish I dreamed of. But I didn’t leave empty-handed.

I walked away (figuratively - rolling away in a gurney on the back of an ATV into an ambulance doesn’t sound as poetic) with perspective. With gratitude for my health. With a deep respect for the sport. With a renewed appreciation for the people in my life who matter more than a time on a clock.

Here’s what I have to latch onto on this day, 3 days from the race:

I am underselling how wild of an experience the time between going down and getting to the hospital was. And I will share more one day. But I am legitimately going to be forever thankful and my perspective on many things in life have been drastically altered because of the experience. If that is all I take from this race - I wish it would’ve come in an easier form - but I will be grateful for this change in lens on life for the rest of my life.

There’s a chance that my “racing” career looks different moving forward. Time will tell. At this point in time, that doesn’t really scare me. Fitness is not a performance in my life, it’s a foundational principle. It is something I will push myself in in differing capacities for the rest of my life.

That quote from the intro of this newsletter - “The ironic tragedy is that life has to be lived forward, but only makes sense in reverse.” Not of all of this has to make sense now. And it will not. Until some time passes. Until some life events happen. Until there are new dots in the future, that looking back, can be connected to these dots of the past. “Oh, because this happened, that opportunity happened, which lead to this..” - I won’t know until time does it’s thing.

If you’re reading this, I hope you chase something big this year. Something that scares you a little. Something that forces you to grow. But I also hope you remember that goals are only one part of the equation. The other part - the bigger part - is keeping perspective. It’s remembering who is around you in your corner while you chase those goals. Who you do it for. Those who sacrifice to support you.

It’s about maintaining the perspective to be competitive with yourself in every area of your life. To not let off the gas on being a great husband every day. Showing up for your kids every day, even when you don’t feel like it. Making sure your parents hear from you on a regular basis. Keeping work on a plane of what it is - work. Never letting it overshadow those who you aren’t a cell on an excel sheet for. It’s about trying to be as appreciative of the really beautiful morning Wednesday sunrise as you were when you bought your new house.

Because at the end of the day, the finish line isn’t the only thing worth crossing.