Running Your Own Race
Carolyn Su, the founder of the Diverse We Run platform, shares some reflections in this NYRR Contributors Circle blog post.
Living here in Boston, there’s always a noticeable swell of energy that pulsates through the city every year as April arrives. One might think it’s due to the beginning of spring, as the cold winter finally thaws, but every runner in the entire Northeast knows: it’s Marathon Season!
The very first Boston Marathon Expo I attended was in 2018, during the infancy years of the social-media-running-world as we know it today. Even then, it was overwhelming: the sea of striped, unicorn jackets flooding Back Bay; meetups dedicated simply to taking selfies with the who’s-who of IG; and the unavoidable, non-stop questioning of race-day goals.
I found myself struggling to keep my footing in the storm of where-to-be, who-to-see, and what-to-do. It was as if there was an invisible current of FOMO pushing through the city, driving a sense of urgency to get to as many places and see as many people as possible.
Fast forward six years, and it’s that time of year again. As I count down the final days before the 2024 Boston Marathon, I find myself revisiting the question of how I want to navigate race weekend festivities: how do I make the most of the weekend, without being driven by a scarcity mentality?
What Defines a Runner?
For most of us (and I’m talking about the 99% of us who run and race and who are NOT professionals being paid to do so), it seems the lines that define a runner are blurry. Marketing departments promote the idea that a “serious runner” is competitive, leggy, and above all, fast. Crew culture tends to lean a bit more inclusive, emphasizing “community,” but even then, it’s hard to escape this seemingly built-in idea that some traits are more desirable—more noble, even—over others. There’s a pervasive, perhaps subconscious, belief that all of our journeys, processes, pathways to success, and even how a person is supposed to show up should have a certain level of homogeneity, otherwise, we’re somehow doing it “wrong.”
With so many sources of messaging, it’s easy to define our validity and credibility as a runner in accordance with existing standards, especially if we’re new to the sport or simply wanting to find a sense of belonging. But the reality is, these external standards will always find us lacking: there will always be more meetups, more shakeouts, more events to attend; there will always be new brands that emerge claiming to encapsulate the purity of the sport; and qualifying times will continue to get faster and more exclusive.
Forging Our Own Identities
So instead of trying to evaluate our validity as a runner with parameters set by others, what if we redefine what it means to be a runner, for ourselves?
What if instead of focusing on reaching an arbitrary time goal, pace, or place, we focus more on how we show up in the process, in the mundane of the day to day? What if our goals were about being consistent, feeling strong, or finding something to be thankful for everyday?
What if, beyond PRs and a calendar full of run meetups, we focus on the impact we make when we show up in the community and sport?
What if, instead of arranging our life around a race schedule, we recognize how being a runner—while a wonderful thing—isn’t the only quality that defines us, and we arrange our running around the full complexities of our life?
Peace in Any Pace
As we enter another whirlwind year of spring and fall marathons, an Olympics, plus many more iconic speed projects sprinkled in between, instead of being driven by the currents of the wave, I challenge all of us—myself included—to reflect upon our own core values and ask:
What would it look like to run my own race and to find peace in my pace?
Read more content from NYRR Contributors Circle members here.
Photograph by Sofia Jaramillo.
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