What drives people to run a half marathon?
When you’re mad enough to run a half marathon…
Tomorrow I will participate in the 33rd edition of the Cordoba half marathon. Crazy I know, who actually pays money to go through pain?? Well, tomorrow alone, a mere 8300 people. Thousands will form behind the start line ready to run their own story. What on earth drives people to voluntarily wake up at the crack of dawn on a Sunday morning, get into some sparse and flimsy racing gear (though it will be freezing cold) travel into the city centre, where of course it will be impossible to park. Head to the racing area, in a semi- trance as if hypnotised and hand all their most precious personal belongings (phone, purse, house keys and car keys) to a complete stranger who promises to store it carefully in an improvised locker room? Because honestly it sounds more than a little crazy to me and yet, despite knowing how loopy this sounds, I’ll find myself doing it in less than 24 hours.
Not only will I quite happily hand over my latest model on the market smart phone to a person I’ve never met before in my life, I will actually find myself talking to complete strangers too as if they are my life long buddies. We’ll share racing stories as proud as if they were war stories and compare injuries as if they were battle wounds. We’ll even end up talking about our loved ones as if we’re in a foreign land, miles from home…