Walking is a Strategy, Not a Surrender

"You ran how many miles?  For how long?"

I'm still surprised when people are awed by the idea of running of marathon.  Granted, 26 miles is not a short distance, but after you've run that far for that long, the shimmer of the feat wears dull.  The truth is, the race is only shocking when you imagine how much time you have to spend doing one thing repetitively, along one route, with minimal breaks.  (Comparably, however, Ironman races, ultramarathon-ing, or even desert relays are practically unfathomable.)
I believe the real reason people are still awed by completing a marathon has to do less with the distance, and more with the how? your body handles the task of mobilizing itself for that long, for (seemingly) no point at all.
Take last weekend, for example.  I participated in a half-marathon (funny, I thought it was too early in my training to be running that far too!), and although my finish time marked needed improvement, I finished strong, my quads didn't hate me, I didn't puke, and I even managed to survive a 2-hour tap class the very next day with minimal muscle soreness.  So in terms of how I managed it all, I'd credit it to strategy, a trigger-point foam roller, and lots of protein.  The only remaining shimmer is in how I managed to talk myself into keeping up a slow jog during miles 9-13, when I really just wanted to walk.
There were, in fact, many moments during the race where I decided to walk for a bit - specifically around mile 6, I was coming down from a great slow incline, and had been jetting through a long out-and-back section of the course when I decided to slow it down for a moment to walk and eat a GU packet.  There was a young woman, slight in frame but breathing raggedly, who saw me start walking and shout-whispered, as she slowly limped past me in her broken-form jog: "You can still do it! Don't give up!"

...while this young lady's encouragement perhaps/hopefully stemmed from a place of sincerity and empathy, it became apparent to me that we had very different perceptions about what was actually happening, mentally and physically, for me, in that moment.
Let's talk about walking during race: it can be a good strategy to walk a bit throughout the race, since it gives your running muscles a break.  It's quite difficult, as many long-distance runners will attest, to start the running up again after a walk.  However it's a clever mental strategy, one I've used time and time again to help my mind realize that the pain is only temporary, the race isn't going to last forever, and if I want to get running again, it will all be over sooner.  Walking, for me, has always been a strategy, not some sort of defeated surrender to "not-running".

Throughout training for my first marathon, Coach Terry always reminded us: "Run your own race."  This has been my guiding principle over the years, a strategy I employ as I begin every race - surrounded by energetic, nervous runners who trot out from the starting line as if they were running for 30 minutes instead of 3-plus hours.  It's a weird sensation, purposefully holding back and slowing down at the beginning of a race, as trillions of people whoosh pass you like buffaloes on stampede.  But, it pays off miles later when you slowly succeed in surpassing all the broken-form Quasimodos who are now heaving air through their mouths as if they were drowning.  "Doing great, keep going!"

People wonder how you run that far, for that long, and I'm telling you: it's all about pacing yourself.  You have to pace yourself before the race, during the race, and throughout the mental roadblocks.  Strategies can manifest in walking, in whether or not you carry a water bottle, in talking aloud to yourself at mile 15, in counting backwards and focusing on form, in packing your drop bag three days before a race...every runner is different.  But it's all for the sake of pushing your limits, for pacing yourself through those mind-boggling challenges that a long-distance race still inspires.

I was out for a run with some local running yokels a few weeks ago, and one of them runs ultra-distance races.  I asked her how she did it, and she explained her most recent race, a 100-mile partner race consisting of running repeatedly around a 12-mile loop:
"I'd just start with one 12-mile loop, and my running partner coached me by saying, at the very beginning of the first loop, 'Ok, you're going to run these next 12 miles at a 12 minute per mile pace. Go...'", she continued, "And then when I finished the first loop, he said to me,'Ok, you're going to run these next 12 miles at a 12 minute per mile pace....' - so I just kept doing that at the beginning of every loop, and after about 8 loops, it was all over."
She also explained that she ate a lot of food while she was running, to keep up her energy - including (but not limited to): chicken noodle soup, a grilled cheese sandwich, hot dogs, and three pints of beer.
Now, I don't know if I'd be able to do 12-mile loop repeats just yet, but her strategy was reasonable - you just have to break it down into little bits, and keep your focus on that one task at hand - running that loop.

When I signed up for my first marathon, I had no agenda.  In truth, I had no idea what I was signing up for actually.  I only realized after I completed it how much it altered my ideas about my limitations, about what I could accomplish when I pace(d) myself, about how a strategy can make or break your efforts.  And I think that's the thing most people don't consider - what they are really truly capable of in terms of "putting your mind to it."
I think beer can be a wise strategy as well, but I'll save that for another post.