A Small Victory
This is why we do it right? This is why I run every evening over and over, day after day, rain wind of shine. This is what it all builds up to – to be the fastest, the strongest, the toughest...the winner.
Victory is the answer to all the questions I have been asking of myself over the last few months, and to which I haven’t been certain of finding until now. I’ve done it. I’ve done what I set out to do. This Saturday morning I am the best.
This is the way that victory makes you feel. The fact that you have beaten ‘him’ or ‘her’ is of no matter, but the fact that you have beaten your doubts, your uncertainties, the constant wonder as to the point of it all, is.
There are numerous facets to running that make you feel good – the relaxation, the sense of achievement, the endorphins – and all are good enough reasons to do it on their own, but none of them give you the same sense of definitive, unequivocal justification as winning.
There is something innate in running that causes you to test yourself every time you do it – to go that bit further, to do each mile that bit quicker, to run just that one more lap – and victory is the culmination of all of this. It makes you remember that there is a point to it all, it justifies all that came before. The strange is, that as a feeling in itself, there isn’t much to winning – its embarrassing, its contrived and the rewards are minimal – but the implications of it are huge. I try to think of it as a bit like getting married – it doesn’t make you feel many different, its not a patch on the feelings that put you there in the first place, but somehow it justifies it all in your mind, making love something tangible and something real.
Thats what I felt when I crossed the line that Saturday, a sense that maybe now everyone would understand what I have known all along – this is it; this is why I do what I do – do you see now?
Its all very well knowing something, but it means nothing if you cannot express it to the world, and to other people in the world. Try as I might, expressing the notion that running 16 miles on a freezing Sunday morning is a wonderful thing to those that do not run, is almost impossible. Only in winning can I show what it means to them, it empirically expresses everything that running means. I am a runner. Running has meaning to the world, rather than the whimsical act of a madman. In the same way you cannot define yourself as a writer until you publish a book, you cannot define yourself as a runner until you win a race.
So is this why i run? No. In the same way as most writers don’t write to become published authors, a musician doesn’t write music to become a popstar – I don’t run to win. I like running. I want to become as good at it as I can. I enjoy going out on a rainy Sunday morning and running 16 miles faster than I ever have before. Then I want to race, because in races i can run even faster, and if I win, then great. It’s a nice feeling and I’m not going to complain about it, but its extraneous to what I am doing. Think of it like Christmas Day. I don’t ask for it, I don’t base the other 364 days of the year around it, but it’s a nice day all the same – an expression of humans being nice to each other.
As humans we need to simplify things to understand each other, it’s the only way we can live together in a community. Okay running isn’t about winning, but how else can we celebrate what it is, how can the rest of the world appreciate what it is? And for this reason I am going to enjoy the moment. I like being a runner. I like running and what it means to me, and if the world is willing to accept this now I’ve won a race, then that’s good enough for me.
Victory is the answer to all the questions I have been asking of myself over the last few months, and to which I haven’t been certain of finding until now. I’ve done it. I’ve done what I set out to do. This Saturday morning I am the best.
This is the way that victory makes you feel. The fact that you have beaten ‘him’ or ‘her’ is of no matter, but the fact that you have beaten your doubts, your uncertainties, the constant wonder as to the point of it all, is.
There are numerous facets to running that make you feel good – the relaxation, the sense of achievement, the endorphins – and all are good enough reasons to do it on their own, but none of them give you the same sense of definitive, unequivocal justification as winning.
There is something innate in running that causes you to test yourself every time you do it – to go that bit further, to do each mile that bit quicker, to run just that one more lap – and victory is the culmination of all of this. It makes you remember that there is a point to it all, it justifies all that came before. The strange is, that as a feeling in itself, there isn’t much to winning – its embarrassing, its contrived and the rewards are minimal – but the implications of it are huge. I try to think of it as a bit like getting married – it doesn’t make you feel many different, its not a patch on the feelings that put you there in the first place, but somehow it justifies it all in your mind, making love something tangible and something real.
Thats what I felt when I crossed the line that Saturday, a sense that maybe now everyone would understand what I have known all along – this is it; this is why I do what I do – do you see now?
Its all very well knowing something, but it means nothing if you cannot express it to the world, and to other people in the world. Try as I might, expressing the notion that running 16 miles on a freezing Sunday morning is a wonderful thing to those that do not run, is almost impossible. Only in winning can I show what it means to them, it empirically expresses everything that running means. I am a runner. Running has meaning to the world, rather than the whimsical act of a madman. In the same way you cannot define yourself as a writer until you publish a book, you cannot define yourself as a runner until you win a race.
So is this why i run? No. In the same way as most writers don’t write to become published authors, a musician doesn’t write music to become a popstar – I don’t run to win. I like running. I want to become as good at it as I can. I enjoy going out on a rainy Sunday morning and running 16 miles faster than I ever have before. Then I want to race, because in races i can run even faster, and if I win, then great. It’s a nice feeling and I’m not going to complain about it, but its extraneous to what I am doing. Think of it like Christmas Day. I don’t ask for it, I don’t base the other 364 days of the year around it, but it’s a nice day all the same – an expression of humans being nice to each other.
As humans we need to simplify things to understand each other, it’s the only way we can live together in a community. Okay running isn’t about winning, but how else can we celebrate what it is, how can the rest of the world appreciate what it is? And for this reason I am going to enjoy the moment. I like being a runner. I like running and what it means to me, and if the world is willing to accept this now I’ve won a race, then that’s good enough for me.
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