Running Quote for the Week: The Roads are Always Open

"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."

-From a 1990 Nike advertisement

One of my all time favorite running quotes from a time when Nike was known for innovative advertising that seemed about changing world perceptions of sport than simply selling shoes.

We sometimes forget that running is one of the most elementary and lost-costs sports in the world.  It requires no special training, expensive equipment, or exclusive facilities.  Lace up your shoes, go outside and you're a runner.   Look around at your next race and notice the diversity of runners.  And while running is a lot about breaking down barriers of mind and body from within, running also breaks down barriers of sex, race, nationality and economic status imposed upon us from society.
Perhaps the best thing about running is the stop watch plays no favorites.

This Week's Running Quote: From a Fortune Cookie

After sifting through quotes from elite athletes and coaches looking this week's running quote, I must admit I being a bit stumped as to which one to use.   But then one day after finishing lunch at a Chinese restaurant, opening my fortune cookie and reading:

"Allow disruptions to deepen your concentration."

I instantly realized this was going to be week's quote.

Running is such a simple elementary action of driving forward with your legs with the arms serving as a counter-balanced repeated thousands of times over the course of a single run.  And yet it's the disruptions to this simple bio-mechanical activity like running for time, running over varied terrain, running through difficult whether, and pushing yourself against other athletes which makes our running strides more powerful and efficient.

We often to seek to minimize disruptions and distractions around race time, and this is made a lot easier if we've dealt with plenty of disruptions in our training.  After all, distruptions don't go away simply because it is race day.

Now if the next fortune cookies I open solemnly advises "Now is the time to start doing mile repeats", I'm going start getting suspicious.

Running Quote for the Week from the new US Olympic Trials Record Holder

"I was excited to see it was really raining."

-Galen Rupp after setting an American record in the Men's Olympic Trial 10,000 Meter Run

After watching Rupp's thrilling victory in the 5,000 meters in the US Olympic Trial, where he retook the lead from Bernard Lagat in the homestretch, breaking running legend Steve Prefontaine's Olympic Trials 5,000 meter record in the process, his impressive 10,000 Olympic Trials victory and record in the pouring rain seems a distant memory.

Truth be told, part of Rupp's excitement about the pouring rain during the start of the Olympic Trials was due to his allergies.  But I find the best athletes tend to thrive under the worst conditions, as if raising the bar on what needs to be accomplished brings the best out of them, and Rupp's quote seems to capture that.   

Rupp's performance in the Olympic Trials 10,000 is also a reminder that race conditions and circumstances are rarely ideal, so make sure your prepared for the anything that might get thrown at you on race day.  You might even get excited when that happens.

Running Quote for the Week: The Unforgiving Minute.....So What?

Our quote for this week center comes from an unlikely source, British, Victorian-era poet Rudyard Kipling, and the "unforgiving minute" is this quote:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Just sixty seconds running? What's that all about?   Lot's of us run for plenty of minutes, even an hour or two, several times a week, and we're much more likely to inherit a bad case of chaffing than the Earth.  What's the big deal here? 

These are actually the last four lines of a poem Kipling wrote in 1910 called If- which totals thirty-two lines and starts off with

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

Now we begin to see some relevance to running.  There are distractions all around you, whether it be the terrain, weather, or traffic and focusing on pace, form, and effort for each run is key in training.  In a race, competitors, crowds, and the race course are added to the mix and success in getting to the finish line is a lot about "keeping you head when all about you are losing theirs".

If you read Kipling's If- in entirety, you'll find his poem is about perseverance, about overcoming barriers, and perhaps more importantly, keeping the mental discipline required for success.  And while Kipling wasn't a runner, it's telling he used running as a metaphor for persistence, effort, and keeping your composure with the rewards they bring.    If you run for all sixty seconds in a minute, or all sixty minutes for an hour, you might not inherit the Earth, but you'll gain strength, discipline, and a sense of accomplishment.

Here is the full text of If-.


If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Running Quote for the Week from a 1980 Colaboration of Running Heavyweights

"There is no slot in which to deposit your excuses and alibis at the finish line"

Marty Liquori and John L. Parker in their book "Marty Liquori's Guide for the Elite Runner"


Published by Playboy Press in 1980, Marty Liquori the American record holder in the 5,000 meters collaborated with the author of the running cult classic novel "Once a Runner" to produce a gem of a book that's long out of print.  Marty Liquori's training plan and running advice is fairly straightforward and hardly revolutionary, but what really makes this book great is the all little insights, stories, and motivation Liquori shares with his readers, opening a window into the mind of a runner from the 1970's golden era of American distance running.

This quote is particularly memorable as it underlies a brutal simplicity of distance running, where all the hard work, joy, pain, and passion over months of training is distilled into a finishing place and a number on a stop watch.