Elite Runners on Failure: How 6 Pro Runners Deal with Disappointment
The Strength Running Podcast
Jason Fitzgerald
4.8 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 12 September 2017
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
But we almost never discuss the failures of the world's best runners.
What does it feel like to never achieve your biggest goal throughout your entire career?
How does an elite keep perspective? Do they ever think about quitting?
Most importantly... how do elites bounce back from setbacks? Do they have a different mindset than us normal runners?
What enables them to continue training at high levels for years?
How do they overcome a bad workout, long run, or race?
These are the questions that I couldn't get out of my head.
So I interviewed six pro runners to get their hot take on failure:
- Alexi Pappas - Olympian, Greek national record holder, and star of Tracktown
- Mike Wardian - racing phenom, world record holder, and nicest guy ever
- Brandy Erholtz - Pikes Peak Ascent champ, US Mountain Running team member
- Nick Symmonds - 2x Olympian and the CEO of Run Gum
- Devon Yanko - 2017 winner of the Leadville Trail 100, multiple national champion
- Travis Macy - ultra runner and author of The Ultra Mindset
They're the stars of Episode 39 of the Strength Running podcast. I think you're going to love this episode.
We talk about their own personal failures, how they bounced back, and whether their approach to failure has changed over time.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Ready, set go. |
| 0:04.0 | This is episode 39 on failure, |
| 0:07.0 | featuring wise words from six professional runners |
| 0:10.0 | on their biggest disappointments and how they bounced back. Hey everyone. I'm super pumped that you're here because this episode is a new |
| 0:30.2 | format of podcast that we're experimenting with today. I don't have a guest. I have six |
| 0:36.0 | guests. All of them are elite athletes, all of them have achieved at the highest level of the |
| 0:41.7 | sport. But that's what makes them different from you and I |
| 0:44.8 | there's far more that makes them similar to recreational runners like us like us |
| 0:49.8 | elite runners get injured like us they fall short of their own expectations, and like us they flat out fail when everything is on the line. |
| 0:59.7 | Today you're going to hear from Olympic 800-meter runner Nick Simmons, this year's Leadville Trail 100 |
| 1:05.0 | winner Devon Yanko, mountain runner Brandy Aerholz, Greek Olympian Alexi Papis, Ultra-Marathon or Travis Macy, and Racing Phenom Mike Wardian. |
| 1:15.0 | Like any runner, these athletes have failed. |
| 1:17.8 | They have fallen, they've come up short. |
| 1:20.0 | Nevertheless, they persisted. |
| 1:22.2 | Their perseverance and tenacity allowed their talent to shine through. |
| 1:26.6 | And I think you can use this same grit to overcome your own failures, develop a more |
| 1:31.6 | positive mindset, and change the trajectory of your running |
| 1:35.1 | for the better. |
| 1:36.7 | And so failure has always captured my imagination because it's not sexy, it's not glamorous, It's not featured in Runner's World |
| 1:45.0 | because we simply don't celebrate failure. |
| 1:48.0 | But I think it can be our ally, |
| 1:50.0 | a potent learning tool that will teach you more about yourself and your capabilities than almost |
... |
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