Learning to Lose - My Running Journey
One of my favorite parts about this fitness journey is the variety of different workouts that I incorporate into my routine. The activities I do most often include, running, swimming, rock climbing, golf, strength training, boxing, jump rope, rowing, and Peloton — sometimes even all in the same week thanks to my obsessive recovery routine. With each activity, I learn something different about my body and my mind. I plan to discuss them in future blog posts sharing what each one means to me. Today’s is about running and how, through my struggles with it, I have learned how to lose.
In my first post, I wrote that “I can assure you that you will learn much more from the days you lose than the ones you win.” But there’s a difference between losing the day, and losing. Nearly every day is winnable. Losing the day simply means that I did not do what I was supposed to do that day. That can be anything — maybe one day I missed an opportunity to workout, while on another it may be that I worked out when my body truly needed rest. It may also have nothing to do with working out. Winning the day is about everything I do.
Losing on the other hand is about failure. Not every task is winnable, nor should it be. Very often, failing is precisely what wins the day.
Failure means trying. It can mean taking on something out of my comfort zone. It can mean doing something I am not good at. And it can mean testing the limits of what I can achieve. Running is all of these to me, and each one wins the day regardless of the outcome. After all, you are not truly doing any of this if you succeed every time.
When I first embarked on the journey, my cardio activity mostly came in the form of walking. It was all my body could handle. Even at age 40, the saying that “you have to learn to walk before you can run” rang true.
When you run, you carry up to three times your body weight in force. Even trying to run at the beginning of my journey would have presented too much risk of injury — and would have set me back. So, it was not until early 2015, when I had lost about 25-30 lbs, that I could try to give it a shot. Even at that point, it was a lot of force on my knees and feet, but I was at least strong enough to go for it.
I started slow — both literally and figuratively. My pace was around 14-15 minutes per mile — yes, some could literally walk that fast. I worked my way up from one-mile runs to taking on three to four-mile races. Each took a toll on my body and involved a good amount of rest around it. My body had to be fresh going into a long run and often needed a few extra days to recover afterwards. I also usually had to walk up the steepest hills of the course. Gradually, I got better, and I decided to set a goal to run the New York City Marathon — not knowing how long it would take me to get there.
I think I set this goal because, in my mind, if I could ever get to the point where I run 26.2 miles, it would mean to me that I have done the impossible — and because I believed I could do it someday. It would be the single defining moment for the mind, body, and fitness accomplishments that I reach for in this journey. Nothing could better represent what I’ve changed about myself than finishing a marathon.
In late 2015, I signed up to run a 15K (9.3 mile) race. That race would nearly double the longest run I had done at that point, but I had often heard, “if you can run 1 mile, then you can run 2; if you can run 2 miles, then you can run 4 . . .” I assumed that also meant, if I could run 4-5, then I could do 9.3. This was to be the next step in my path towards running the marathon.
To start with, yes, I did finish this run — barely. In doing so, I learned that my body could not have taken another step. In fact, after the race, I was in so much pain for days that I had to accept the simple truth that I would not be able to run the marathon, and it was best for my body to stop running.
My body was not where I wanted or needed it to be for running, and it had a long way to go. With respect to my goal of running the marathon, I lost. It wasn’t happening anytime soon, and I accepted that it may never happen.
I had made no secret of my intentions to run the marathon, so discovering that I had no shot of doing so was defeating — but I was cool with it. I had to stop running in order to progress with my fitness. It was best for my body not to beat it up that way. Running limited how much I could do to get fitter and stronger, so I came to terms with this and picked myself up to continue my fitness journey - regardless of whether running would ever be part of it again.
In so many ways, this loss was a win.
First, running is always a reality check for me. I knew I was making progress in my fitness, and if I had just compared where I was at that moment with where I had been when I started, I could have been satisfied with what I achieved. But running races where I routinely finished towards the very back, showed me how much further I had to go. In the 15K, I finished 4,886th out of 4,900 finishers. Running keeps me looking ahead at what I need to achieve rather than looking behind at what I already accomplished.
My data from running a 15K in December 2015. A race (and sport) that was not meant for my body at the time.
Second, running teaches me to test my limits. When you succeed at doing something hard, you probably haven’t reached your limits. When you fail at it, you know what you have left to work on. There’s no limit for the goals I can set with running. Anytime I succeed, I can reset the mark to go faster or farther.
Third, running teaches me patience. I’ve stressed this one throughout the blog, but changes don’t happen overnight, and embracing the long game gets me through the tough times. Setbacks are a natural part of any difficult journey. Overcoming them requires a commitment to getting through the toughest days even when I think I am going nowhere.
Finally, running has taught me that it’s ok to get knocked down because what matters is how I get back up.
So, seven years (and 100+ lbs. of more weight loss) later, I started running again. I could have started again sooner, but I had almost forgotten about my dream of running the marathon. I had built up a beast-mode routine mixing cardio and strength training in my workouts, but I was also getting comfortable. One day last November, I decided to run.
This time I started slow again — but only figuratively. I went for a relatively short 2-mile run, but I was finished it over 3 minutes faster per mile than the last time I ran! My body felt amazing. I had a new body to work with, and running was much different now. It was easier. Who knew that it didn’t even take running to get better at running?
From there, I worked running into my routine, and I do it more often with no pain or setbacks. I started wondering if the marathon was a possibility this time, so I decided to test my limits again. I signed up for races again, and the 3 to 4-mile ones have been no problem. With each one, I crushed my personal records. I ran faster and farther, having worked my way up to 6-mile runs.
Then, just two weeks ago, I tried a run that was far more than anything I had done before — a 12-mile race doing two loops around Central Park. Once again, it was double what my longest had been. In case you are wondering, this undoubtedly fit within my mantra of doing something that scares me.
Again, I started this one slow – literally. I had no idea what pace I should be running at for this unfamiliar distance, so I focused on keeping my heart rate steady and under 150 BPM as much as possible. I knew that my cardio could go for a long time in the 140’s, so this would mostly be a test of the strain on my body. The steepest part of the run was a hill about a mile into the run and again just after 7 miles. It helped that it was still crowded the first time up, so I ran at the pace of the crowd (and even had time to take a short video).
After the first 6-mile lap, I was feeling great and thought I could pick up the pace. But since I was just crossing the threshold of my longest run, I kept it steady until I reached the top of the steep hill again. After that, I had about 4 miles to go, and I was still feeling great. I picked up my pace (and heart rate) because (1) I knew I could reach a pace under 12 minutes per mile, and (2) I wanted to finish sooner. With the exception of the 11th mile, each mile I ran over the last four was faster than anything I had run over the first eight. With one mile remaining, and feeling awesome, I ran my fastest mile of the race to the finish line as I placed 3,520th out of 4,235 finishers. The only thing that slowed me down was getting emotional at the end.
My data from running 12 miles on August 24. My official time was 2:22:18. The "moving time" is shorter due to the fact that it excludes pit stops. Either way, it was faster than when I had run 9 miles almost seven years earlier.
I got choked up crossing the finish line with tears in my eyes. In that moment, I was overwhelmed with emotion while I reflected on a journey that I once thought was a failure. I recalled the moment when I accepted the loss and how much it hurt to realize I could not run. But now I can run — and I will finish the 2025 New York Marathon.
Running teaches me how to lose in the best way — that it is not how I get knocked down; it’s how I get back up. My failure, just like the ones so many others go through, was no failure at all. In fact, the only failure that is truly a loss, is the failure to try.
Aaron