If marathoners finish they win.

To make your life a work of art, you must have the material to work with. The race, any race, is just such an experience.

Have you ever felt worse after a run?

I run each day to preserve the self I attained the day before and to secure the self yet to be.

Like everyone else, I want to be challenged. I want to find out whether or not I am a coward. I want to see how much effort I can put out . . . what I can endure . . . if I measure up. Running allows that.

Fitness is just a stage you pass through on the way to becoming a racer.

We who run...are different from those who merely study us. We are out there experiencing what they are trying to put into words.

Running is just such a monastery- a retreat, a place to commune with God and yourself, a place for psychological and spiritual renewal.

And while these pounds were being shed, while the physiological miracles were occurring with the heart and muscle and metabolism, psychological marvels were taking place as well. Just so, the world over, bodies, minds, and souls are constantly being born again, during miles on the road.