Life Lessons Learned Running 100 Miles that we all Could Use

I was laying on my hotel bed after completing the Forbidden Forest 100 Mile 30 Hour Endurance Run trying to rest my body and sleep but I couldn’t.  My body was in too much pain.  Whenever I rolled to a side it hurt. I had not slept in almost 40 hours but sleep was not coming easy.  I had showered and eaten so the next thing I needed was sleep. Yet it was the one thing eluding me. I had taken some Ibuprofen to ease the pain but that seemed to have no effect. It was as if my body was rejecting the idea of rest, or more likely it was telling me this is what happens when you do stupid things like running 100 miles.

My wife was observing this, wondering if she would also not get any sleep because of all the flailing and moaning I was doing. Eventually however the pain subsided and I fell asleep.

The next morning when I awoke my body felt much better but I was definitely a little stiffer than usual and moving slower than normal. While my body may have been moving slower my mind was racing. You cannot run a hundred miles for the first time without reflecting back on the experiences and reliving all the parts of the race, the good, the bad, and the strange. (Like a moth fluttering by your headlamp and landing in your ear!) The race may have been over but the experience was not.

There are things that we all know in life but we really do not internalize them until we experience them. That is what happened to me. I learned a lot about achieving success and pushing yourself beyond your limits not just in a race but in life itself. You may be thinking to yourself “Ray do I have to run a hundred miles to learn these life lessons?” The answer is “no” because I did that for you! You can thank me later.

What are these life lessons about succeeding and achievement?

It ain’t easy! – We all tend to look for the easiest path to get to where we are going. Whether that is in our careers or personal life. There are whole industries built on selling little pills that will make us thinner, more muscle bound, or even happy. Yet the easy path rarely leads to great achievement.

Running a hundred miles is not easy and to be quite frank, I was not 100% certain that I could do it.  It was exhausting to keep going and as I explained previously I was in extreme pain for a while after the race. There were obstacles that I had to overcome, in order to succeed. However the feeling of accomplishment that I felt after finishing the race was in direct proportion to it’s difficulty. I felt like I was on cloud nine after finishing this race because of how it tested me.

Think about your greatest successes in your life, and what made them standout in your mind, it probably was because others were not sure you could do it.  Maybe even you were not sure. It was a great success because it was not easy.

Many years ago at work I told my boss and a senior colleague that I think that I could get the governor to speak to our members.  They looked at me and politely stifled their snickering and said “go ahead try”.  I ended up doing it.

The point is we have to challenge and push ourselves. Nothing great will be achieved, if we just take the path of least resistance.

Go find your challenge. If you are a runner, find that race. If not, I am sure that there is a challenge that you have, maybe you only thought about it to yourself privately. What are you waiting for?

We Need Other People – I like to think that I am a badass because I ran a 100 miles but the reality is that while it is great individual achievement, it was not a solo act.  I had a crew that would get me my water and food so that I did not have to think about it.  I could tell them what I would need at my next pit stop. This all saved me precious time. My wife would also be scanning my face to look for signs of dehydration, overheating, and general exhaustion.

Maybe more importantly than the physical help they provided, it was the energy they gave me by cheering me on.  When you have friends and family cheering you on it gives you extra energy.

It was not just my crew that gave me that mental boost, it was Celeste’s crew (She was my tent neighbor at the pit stop. I discuss her and others in my first blog as well as my second from the race.) who also cheered me on.  The race director and the race volunteers were all positive.  My friend Ian Hockley also stopped by and cheered me on and boosted my spirits. Anyone who is runner knows that other runners are always so supportive.  As a rule, we always cheer each other on.  Strangely, even my Facebook friends who were following my race posts gave me energy.  Even though I did not have time to read them while I was running I saw my notifications light up and I knew that they were all positive. This all boosted my spirit.

If the COVID-19 pandemic taught us anything it is that we are social creatures.  Yes, we can stay at home and have ample food and shelter, be with our families but what we missed was all our other friends and family.  There is an energy you get from other people, which we sometimes forget about and it is powerful. A co-worker may have been an integral component to one of your major successes at work.

The key is to surround yourself with positive people who help inspire and push you.  Not negative people who always bring the energy down.

Me with Ian Hockley

Planning Matters – We can all successfully “wing it” once and a while but that is usually the exception not the rule.  I was not going to be successful just “winging it” on this race I had to plan my training and think through all the details of the race. That meant, my food, hydration, gear, obstacles such as heat or rain, as well as my pace in order to make it to the end. That plan included when I would change my shoes, socks, and shirt. When I would probably need different foods. If I had no plan then I would have no finish.

Natural talent and ability can only take you so far.  There was a young runner, who had a most smooth gait when he ran. He passed me about five times and I was sure that he would break the course record because it was looking so effortlessly to him.  I remember we were both checking our laps at the same time and he was four laps in front of me and was leading the second place runner by almost two laps.  When he heard he was leading and closing in on fifty miles he asked no one in particular “Should I slow down?” I thought that was an odd thought for such a talented runner. As we entered the night I remember thinking to myself I had not seen him in a while.  I later asked about him and learned that had dropped out. This was not only his first 100 mile race, it was also his first race ever! He really had no plan and burned out despite his talent.  I hope that he is not too discouraged because he has talent he just needs to plan a bit.

In America there is a mantra “Mind over Matter” yet while we all need a strong will to succeed, I will say “that matter – matters”.  You may want it badly but poor planning and training will derail even the most strong willed.  On all the ultras that I have run I would say the runners I saw who were ill prepared rarely finished.

Earlier I described a great success at work when I promised to get the governor. I did not wing it I had a plan and worked it constantly till I succeeded.

Channel your Inner Badass – the Mental Game – Running a 100 miles or pushing yourself to past your limits at any distance is not just a physical challenge but is also a mental challenge. Often times a great mental challenge. There will be times no matter how well you planned when things will go wrong maybe an injury or the weather.  You will be exhausted, sore, cold, and just want to stop.

I stopped writing when I got this point. Because the clichéd sayings came to my head.  You have to “dig down deep” show “grit and determination” as if “mental toughness” is a switch you can just flip on and off.  I am no expert on the mental game of a 100 mile race or any race for that matter, or even having mental toughness in life. All I can say is what worked for me in both instances. Though getting through the low points of a race are easier than some of the low points in life.

For grueling races I can train in bad conditions so that as I say I am “comfortable with being uncomfortable” I also never look at the entire distance when in an ultra-marathon. I break it into segments or legs. Like going from aid station to aid station. In this loop race getting to certain numbers of loops.  Those smaller chunks of distance are always attainable. If you think of the whole prospect of running another 50 miles you can get overwhelmed, but if you say I have to go another 5 miles you are okay. The key however is to keep moving forward. As they say “if you are in hell keep moving till you get out”

This lesson from an ultra is very apropos for life itself. When my father had passed away I was stuck wallowing in my sorrow. When you suffer a death of a loved one it can really hit you hard. Even if you know it is coming, you don’t know how it will affect you until it happens.  For me I tend to get stuck as I said wallowing in my own sadness.  The only way out was to start moving forward again into my regular life of work and family. It is like an ultra-marathon, just keep moving forward.

Don’t Compare Yourself to Others – This is counter intuitive because it is after all a race. In a race you place people by order of time or in this case distance.  Yet as any runner knows while there may be thousands of entrants in a race or maybe even only seventy five most of us have no chance of winning the race.  You are in essence competing against yourself. Trying to bring out the best in ourselves. Our successes and accomplishments are relative. My accomplishment of 100 miles was no greater or maybe even less than Ilene’s doing under 20 miles on crutches and suffering from a bone disease.

In life we all tend to compare ourselves to others as well.  We look jealously at friends and neighbors who have a bigger house, better cars, and go on more spectacular vacations. In the work place it seems everyone is watching each other and judging whether someone really deserved that promotion or not.

In a race I cannot control what the other races do I just have to concentrate on my actions to achieve success. The same is true about life we can control our own actions and efforts but have little to no impact on most other people and it is wasted time and energy to do so.

Enjoy and Reflect on the Journey – Nonrunners may not understand this but no matter what the distance the race is, runners share a bond and are always supportive of each other. It is why we are always signing up for races because the energy is always so positive. This is even truer the longer and tougher the race is because of the shared challenge and one could say shared misery.

On this 100 mile race I made new friendships with Celeste, Ilene, and the Race Director Lou. I had a shared experience with my wife and daughter. I could reflect even while in the midst of the race about how lucky I was to have the ability to even, attempt this challenge. While I was focused on getting to my final destination I thoroughly enjoyed the entire race atmosphere.  I talked to some runners who did not get to 100 miles and they too just loved the journey even though they did not get to their goal.

While important in a race it is even more important in life to enjoy the journey. Too often we are only focused on destinations like a promotion or new home and do not take enough time to be thankful for our friends and family. It is so important to take time out from a hectic life to spend with those people who love us.

To think I had to run 100 miles to learn all this. Now you may challenge my lessons if you want but first run 100 miles and then get back to me.