Favorite Quotes

Here are some of my favorite quotes. Putting in on one page so if you need some motivation come check it out. Feel free to comment and add your favorites.

• “A lot of people run a race to see who’s the fastest. I run to see who has the most guts.”
  - Steve Prefontaine
• “I am both proud of and embarrassed by that run. What kind of geek goes out and runs in a cloudburst just before midnight on his honeymoon? Me, I guess. But probably many others, too. You know who you are.”
  - Mark Will-Weber The Quotable Runner
• “In running, it doesn’t matter whether you come in first, in the middle of the pack, or last. You can say, ‘I have finished.’ There is a lot of satisfaction in that.”
  -Fred Lebow, New York City Marathon co-founder
• “Ask yourself: ‘Can I give more?’. The answer is usually: ‘Yes’.”
  -Paul Tergat, Kenyan professional marathoner
• “The miracle isn’t that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start.”
  -John Bingham, running speaker and writer
• “You have to wonder at times what you’re doing out there. Over the years, I’ve given myself a thousand reasons to keep running, but it always comes back to where it started. It comes down to self-satisfaction and a sense of achievement.”
  - Steve Prefontaine
• People today tend to overdo. This applies especially, I think, to distance runners and the training they do. What you should do is develop a training program that suits your physical makeup, your stamina, and your ability as a runner.
  -Gayle Barron, marathoner
• Winning is nice, but you savor that victory for an evening and it’s gone. Competing well is just not to be equated with winning.
  -Bill Bowerman, running coach
• When your’re young and just beginning, you have a dream, an unrealistic dream, of what you can achieve. Follow that dream, hold onto it. Don’t let it disappear.
  -Franklin Jacobs, former indoor world record holder in the high jump
• The first thing I had to do was learn that I could do it
  - Sue Stricklin, runner
• Make running a habit. Set aside a time solely for running. running is more fun if you don’t have to rush through it.
  -Jim Fixx
• People get a relief from tension by running. One thing that almost always happens is that your sense of self-worth improves. You accept yourself a little better
  -Ted Corbitt, former U.S. Olympic marathoner
• “Running is real and relatively simple – but it ain’t easy.”
  -Mark Will-Weber
• “Your toughness is made up of equal parts persistence and experience. You don’t so much outrun your opponents as outlast and outsmart them, and the toughest opponent of all is the one inside your head.”
  - Joe Henderson
• “You don’t run against a bloody stop watch, do you hear? A runner runs against himself, against the best that’s in him. Not against a dead thing of wheels and pulleys. That’s the way to be great, running against yourself. Against all the rotten mess in the world. Against God, if you’re good enough.”
  - Bill Persons
• “Those who say that I will lose and am finished will have to run over my body to beat me.”
  - Said Aouita
• “A runners creed: I will win; if I cannot win, I shall be second; if I cannot be second, I shall be third; if I cannot place at all, I shall still do my best.”
  - Ken Doherty
• “If one can stick to the training throughout the many long years, then will power is no longer a problem. It’s raining? That doesn’t matter. I am tired? That’s besides the point. It’s simply that I just have to.”
  - Emil Zatopek
• “Running is a big question mark that’s there each and every day. It asks you, ‘Are you going to be a wimp or are you going to be strong today?’”
  - Peter Maher
• “I’m going to go out a winner if I have to find a high school race to win my last race.”
  -Johnny Gray
• “There are clubs you can’t belong to, neighborhoods you can’t live in, schools you can’t get into, but the roads are always open.”
  -Nike
• “It hurts up to a point and then it doesn’t get any worse.”
  -Ann Trason
• “My first understanding was that you could not become a distance runner quickly. I began gradually, not doing too much.”
  - Henry Rono (champion runner)
• “Running gives me confidence”
  -Steve Prefontaine
• “Every time I bomb out, I have to come back. I have a feeling after a bad race that my next one will be good.”
  -Bill Rodgers
• “Learn to listen to your body. It will tell you when you’ve done enough work.”
  -Gayle Barron (marathoner)
• “There is no way to explain the feeling properly. It’s one of those rare fellings that cannot be told to anyone who hasn’t been there. It’s simply the best feeling I’ve ever experienced.”
  -Mark Osmun (Just after finishing his first marathon)
• “Records don’t mean much. Racing is about people and not clocks.”
  -Steve Ovett (middle distance runner)
• “I’ve learned to read my body very well. By staying healthy I haope to run for the rest of my life. That’s the big goal now.”
  -Ann Audain (masters runner)
• “Keep varying the program. Your body will tell you what to do.”
  -Joan Benoit
• “Sustained motivation is essential to achieving your potential”.
  -Grete Waitz
• “If you feel like eating, eat. Let your body tell you what it wants.”
  - Joan Benoit Samuelson
• “I like running because it’s a challenge. If you run hard, there’s the pain – and you’ve got to work your way through the pain. You know, lately it seems all you hear is? Don’t overdo it’ and? Don’t push yourself.’ Well, I think that’s a lot of bull. If you push the human body, it will respond.”
  - Bob Clarke, Philadelphia Flyers general manager, NHL Hall of Fame.
• “In a country where only men are encouraged, one must be one’s own inspiration.”
  - Tegla Loroupe, Kenya, 1994 New York City Marathon champion
• “Out of the silver heat mirage he ran. The sky burned, and under him the paving was a black mirror reflecting sun-fire. Sweat sprayed his skin with each foot strike so that he ran in a hot mist of his own creation. With each slap on the softened asphalt, his soles absorbed heat that rose through his arches and ankles and the stems of his shins. It was a
  carnival of pain, but he loved each stride because running distilled him to his essence and the heat hastened this distillation.”
  - James Tabor, from “The Runner,” a short story
• “When the meal was over we all had a quiet rest in our rooms and I meditated on the race. This is the time when an athlete feels all alone in the big world. Opponents assume tremendous stature. Any runner who denies having fears, nerves or some kind of disposition is a bad athlete, or a liar.
  - Gordon Pirie
• “God determines how fast you’re going to run; I can help only with the mechanics.”
  - Bill Bowerman
• “If a man coaches himself, then he has only himself to blame when he is beaten.”
  - Sir Roger Bannister
• “Somewhere in the world someone is training when you are not. When you race him, he will win.”
  - Tom Fleming’s Boston Marathon training sign on his wall
• “In my business hours I avoid fatigue. I do this by not doing too much work – the only trustworthy recipe.” – E V. Knox, writer
• “Be silent about great things; let them grow inside you. Before all greatness, be silent: in art, in music, in religion: silence.” – Baron Friedrich von Hugel, philosopher
• “Seeing is believing, but feeling is God’s own truth.” – Irish Proverb
• “Runners need to take responsibility for the health of their muscles, not just how fast they go Recovery has to be an integral part of training” -Linda Jaros, massage therapist
• “I have realized that the past and the future are real illusions, that they exist only in the present, which is what there is and all that there is.” -Alan Watss, philosopher
• “I traveled the whole world looking for adventure, and found it in my own body.” – Unidentified writer-runner
• “The individual is what he is and has the significance that he has not so much in virtue of his individuality, but rather as a member of a great human community, which directs his material and spiritual existence from the cradle to the grave. ” -Albert Einstein
• “Then summer fades and passes. We will smell smoke then, and feel an unsuspected sharpness, a thrill of nervous, swift elation, a sense of sadness and departure.” – Thomas Wolfe
• “Duty does not have to be dull. Love can make it beautiful and fill it with life.” – Thomas Merton, writer
• “Do it the right way, which is the long way. You can’t cram for a marathon, because the final exam for a marathon will never allow you to be successful if you take shortcuts.” -Bill Wenmark, running coach
• “At the end of my daily jaunt I was totally exhausted. Then, gradually, a strange thing happened. I began to realize that it was taking me less and less energy to run a mile. I way beginning to get in shape.” -David Burhans Jr., runner
• “People should be encouraged to prepare properly. We need to teach them to put less emphasis on trying to perform well, and more on having fun, and staying within their range.” – Dr. John Bagshaw, advising runners prior to a race
• “In a marathon I never let myself think, I’ve got 26 miles ahead of me. You have to think of your race as it is then and there. At the same time you keep in mind the prospects for the future.” -Bill Rodgers, marathoner
• “Nothing helps me sort out problems better than lacing up my shoes and taking a turn aound the park.” – Judity Kaye, runner
• “He has to try running fast and slow, learn from his mistakes, and then figure out his own magic formula.” – Roger Bannister, legendary miler, on how runners succeed