What an individual sport taught me about team work (I finished a fucking marathon y'all)

I completed running the 2023 Naha Marathon this year. As a lot of runners say, running 42.195 km, will test your limits both physically and mentally. You will see your life, flash before you eyes in the painful yet rewarding 5-6 hours. (Quick side note, you may have to confront your traumas and insecurities. )

Earlier this year, my partner, our friends and I decided to run a full marathon. There wasn’t a specific reason why, but looking back now, it might have been a sense of curiosity coming from somewhere and a hint of wanting to prove something to someone. Personally, I’d always been running since my high school tennis club days and running was never something I drained. In fact, I found it therapeutic and somewhat similar to meditation. So thinking about continuing that for a full marathon didn’t seem like too much of a hurdle at first. A sense of confidence with a hint of ego is always the best recipe to put you in catastrophic situations.

From then on, we ran almost every single day for 6 months. There were days running 15km was a piece of cake, then some days, I would feel my heart pounding so fast at just 3km. When I had early meetings, I would wake up before 5, to cross off the daily run check box. It was a battle with perseverance and physical stamina. Being on vacation was never an excuse. We would try to find lakes, parks, gyms where we can run at, just to not lose what we’d been working so hard towards.

Fast forward, it’s November, just one month before the race. My partner is at his best condition yet and I’m starting to feel the pressure of running 42.195 km. What the heck did I get myself into?

When we would go on our usual runs, I could feel myself not enjoying the run as much as I used to.It wasn’t therapeutic at all at this point. Though I wasn’t injured at all, my legs were not running as smoothly as they once did. One time, when my partner ran faster than me, he found me behind him, and he slowed down out of kindness. I remember snapping at him in this moment “you’re messing up my pace, can you make up your mind whether you want to go fast or slow?“ What an absolutely silly/immature thing to say, it was definitely an ugly side of myself happened due to sheer panick and nerves of not being able to finish this marathon. I could feel myself lashing out at him, concealing the true emotions I had inside, just like an iceberg hiding away the massive block of ice they have under water.

It was an American writer called Ernest Hemingway who came up with the Iceberg Theory (aka the "theory of omission") . Just like only one small portion of the iceberg is presented above water, Hemingway’s stories presents only a small fraction of the characters and omits what is actually happening. However, the largest portion of the iceberg is actually under sea level and is often the strongest part of the iceberg. Similarly, the strongest part of Hemingway’s stories are hidden from the reader.

ICeberg theory

Words and actions are the basic methods of communication that is cognitive to others. If you do not look under water, there’s no way other people will fully understand you.

My actions and words that day, were only the tip of the iceberg, and concealed the true bigger emotions I had sunk under water. Thing is though, if you don’t choose to look underwater, there’s no way other people will fully understand you and know how to lend an extra hand.

One night, we all went out for drinks. We would talk strategy for the marathon. “We should start off at this pace“ “There will be a lot of people in the beginning so let’s try to go fast“ “Take your energy gels at this mark“ “Drink water at this many stations“. I could feel the tenseness in my body, and my smile becoming forced.

Then one of the guys said, “we should all try to run together if we can.“ Everyone agreed, because we needed to pace ourselves and encourage each other to run. If we didn’t have that, we might not finish. I quickly answered to that, “I want to run on my own.“

That night, I snapped and had a mental breakdown.

I finally admitted I’m scared. “I dont think I have what it takes to run a marathon“. My partner responded to that saying, “Shiho, no one is not scared in this group. That’s why we’re trying to run together, so we can support each other and finish together.“ Then that’s when it hit me, running together is not about providing your baggages and accepting other peoples baggages. It’s about admitting your weaknesses and accepting people’s strengths and vice versa.

Thing is, I’ve never been a team player. I mean, I’ve played sports as a team and all these other team activities, but the fear of disappointing someone due to my weaknesses and imperfections, or even being disappointed by someone else never sat well with me.

One of my core memories in High School, is playing tennis. For one important match, I competed as part of a doubles. My teammate, had incredible stability in her shots. Mine were lower success rates but had strong serves and shots that could potentially be a winning shot. However, that very day, I was in my worst condition. None of my shots made it. I was panicking, my teammate asked me “what’s going on? “ I answered, “I don’t know.“ Then shortly I made the losing shot, and just sat there on the court until the referee told me to get off the court. I never even wanted to play doubles. I didn’t want to be the root cause of why my friend couldn’t make it to the finals, and honestly I didn’t want her to be the reason for mine. The slightest bit of ego inside of me, also wanted to see where I could go on my own.

This journey of running a full marathon, completely changed that. After my little hysteric episode, I admitted to my partner, and most importantly, myself that I am afraid of this marathon, and that I didn’t know if I could do it alone. Understanding and admitting these true emotions, helped my iceberg move forward.

On Marathon day, my partner, our friends were all ready. I was ready. My partner’s parents also came to support us. We were all in this together. I was scared but I knew my support group was with me.

During the marathon, already in the beginning phase, I could feel the pace my friends were going, was too fast. That’s when my partner and his brother slowed down for me. They kept giving me water, reminding me to take my gel. At 20 something mark, I lost my partner in the herd of people. At this point, it was only his brother and I. His brother had sprained both his legs making it almost impossible to run. He told me to go first. Right there, although he couldn’t run, I knew it was mentally impossible for me to go forward without him, I needed his mentality, I needed him to be beside me. Him too, because he had sprained his legs I think running by me, provided him some kind of positive pressure to move forward.

Then a few more hours later, we did it. We finally did it. We made the finish mark. Most importantly, we made it together.

Sometimes just as much as you need to understand your strengths, you just need to admit your weaknesses too. Then with a little bit of help from your friends, you manage to get by, just like life.