Never forget where you started. Only then can you fully appreciate how far you have come.
Melbourne Marathon
While the Hundred City Run started only a few months ago, you could say the journey to get here really commenced long before that on a day that changed the course of my life forever.
It was the day I got dumped by a girl.
I know, I know. How lame... However, I'm sure many of you reading have been through this before yourself. Life is good, all is well, then BLAMO! and you’re walking down the street, soaked and sorry in the pouring rain as rose petals wilt and fall from your hands to the soggy drain puddles around you.
The break-up came from nowhere, and I was truly surprised because I didn't really get it. I thought I was nice, funny and kind. Wasn't that what she wanted? I was sure that I had tried my very best through all the time we spent together, so that could not be it. I turned to my physical self, examining my arms, legs, and torso. I saw a body that was crafted from a life of unhealthy eating with some casual jogging mixed in; a man who was weedy, weak and unfit.
I was convinced. This was it. She wanted a stronger man, a fitter man. A better man. So, I had to change myself and become better.
Today, as I write this, I look back at myself and can see clearly how foolish I was. I've learned since that it really had nothing to do with me, or with her. Nothing was wrong, and sometimes people don't work together. That's just the way it is. To look back and think I felt weak, helpless and pathetic makes me sad for past-Angus, and is truly one of the lower moments in my life.
However, it also became one of my best. Whether for the right reason or not, that moment was the catalyst to try something new in my life. It started me down a path that I grew to love, where I met a lot of new people, encountered a host of new experiences, and learned a bunch of new lessons that made me feel strong, confident and whole.
One of these stood out amongst the rest as I ran my third marathon in my home city of Melbourne, Australia, and it was a lesson delivered in the dark, cold, morning hours of winter.
The Warriors of Faulkner Park
Six months later I woke at 5-am to drag myself out of bed. I dressed myself in warm workout gear, fumbling with the laces of my runners in my groggy state, and shuffled out of my apartment into the cold morning of the Melbourne. Toorak road was quiet in the cold. I wiped the sleep from my eyes. I saw the frost of my breath dance in front of me with each exhale under the light of the roadside lampposts as I climbed the gradual hill to Faulkner Park. My knees were stiff. My back was tight. The walk was only fifteen minutes, but it felt like fifty.
I shook my head. What the heck was I doing?
Over the hill and into the park, I followed the road down to the carpark of a community centre. It was closed at this time, but a set of overhead lights remained on to illuminate a carpark close to the front door.
This was where they supposed to be meeting... but I was alone.
I gulped. I had totally, and utterly, stuffed this up.
I was seconds away from turning back home when all of a sudden a pair of headlights pulled into the driveway. A small car pulled into the first parking space, muffled pop blaring from inside. Then another set, and another. Like clockwork they streamed in one-by-one with astounding regularity, as if it were a known and pre-planned schedule. I was nervous, mouth dry as a grey-shirted woman approached.
"Hi, I’m Courtney!"
I gulped. "H-hi," I stammered, taking a firm and confident hand. I prepared myself for some harsh questions, but instead the newcomer just said, cheerily, "Are you here to join us? Great!"
Before I could say any more, some other members had walked over, arms outstretched.
"G'day, I'm Pam!"
"Hi mate, I'm Joe."
And over the next five minutes, a train of people welcomed me. I was a stranger to them, yet each new arrival popped out of a car and same to say hello before anything else, warming my heart.
They called themselves the "Original Bootcamp Crew", and as I'd come to learn they were more than just ordinary people. In their daily lives they were plumbers, carpenters, and corporate workers. Some of them large, some of the were small. Some of them were fast, some of them were slow. Yet, no matter who they were during the day, three-times-per-week they would meet at 6-am morning all year round. Rain, hail or shine, they would band together to challenge their physical and mental selves in a series of tough, gruelling workouts lead by the man who drove the van: Sarge Murray.
Everything changed when he arrived. A green van with a bulldog painted on the side pulled into the carpark, and all of a sudden the welcoming stopped. They switched into a new mode. Each one rushed over to the large vehicle as it slid open its doors and revealed the array of workout equipment. In a matter of minutes they joined together as a unit, gathered the gear, and carried it down to the green grass oval to be setup with orderly precision. I was star-struck. This was something I’d never seen before, and they did it with a smile on their face. Though it was dark, cold and early, they clearly loved every second of it.
"Angus!" Sarge Murray shook my hand, grip firm and strong. He was shorter than me in height, but I could already see he was taller than me in every other possible way. "Welcome to the team."
No try-outs. No tests. No initiations. All it took was hello and I was one of them.
Many things struck me over the course of that 90 minutes, my first experience of its kind. As they trained, they called each other’s names, patted each other on the back for a job well done after each set, or assisted each other with helpful advice for improvement. They cracked jokes during sit-ups, and tried to make each other laugh during push-ups. When running laps the quickest members would turn around after they finished, jog back and run to the finish with the slower ones as added support.
Yet there was a sheer averageness to these warriors. There were no Olympians here. No professional athletes. They were just decent, kind people from all walks of life, living in Melbourne and going about their days as ordinary people. They all had different family setups. They all had different jobs. They all grew up in different places around the world. They were all different ages and held different life experiences.
They were all different people, and yet they had one thing that bonded them together: a plain, grey T-shirt.
It was said that when you put on that grey shirt, everything else outside no longer mattered, and they were all equal. They were all the same. They were all there for the same reasons. They were all there to put themselves through the same tests. They were all there not to face off against each other, but against themselves internally. They were a team, and they were pushing their personal limits.
I was hooked from the start. The skinny, weak Angus started to see a new path. He started to feel like there was something more.
But...
The workout was truly difficult. My fingers were freezing around the Revo bars. I could barely hold the dumbbells in my fists and sandbags over my shoulders. overly heavy. My sit-ups, push-ups and squats were slow and heavy in the cold morning. I laboured while the rest of the group pumped through ahead of me, pushing themselves hard. I couldn't keep up. I couldn't do this.
I sensed Sarge Murray could tell what I was thinking as I breathed heavily in the dewy grass. When he stood before us at the end of the session, covered in water, grass and mud, he smiled.
"Every single one of us started from somewhere," he commanded over the group as the sun rose behind our backs. "Each person here had their first day at OBC, and each one of us here has come a long way on their own journey since then. We remember that person we each used to be, because only then can we truly appreciate who we are now and the journey we have all been on. Well done to all of you. Now, for breakfast!"
A cheer went up at the end, and I saw a smile directed at me from the Sarge.
I learnt many lessons from the year and a half I spent with the Original Bootcamp Crew at Faulkner Park. Most of those lessons came from the early mornings we pushed things, lifted things, carried things, and sprinted around things. We had many mantras to help us through the most difficult of times, but that lesson from Sarge was one among them that has stood out clearer than the rest.
Never forget where you started.
The Marathon
Melbourne sits in the south-eastern state of Victoria, and so despite Australia’s reputation as a hot, dry desert, I remember the winters here as cold, wet and grey. The city is famous for its sport, being the home of Aussie Rules Football, the Australian Grand Prix, the Australian Open tennis, Olympic games, Commonwealth games and more. Its gardens are world-renowned, its running and walking paths well-maintained, and so it makes an excellent running city. My anticipation was bubbling. This was where I had grown up before moving to Canada. I had two marathons under my belt now, and now I had a score to settle with Melbourne. I had spent my younger days here telling myself the marathons were out of reach, and so today I would re-run my old trails with a new mindset.
It would be a new mindset of possibility.
Since the second marathon I had learned a little more about fuelling. My encounter with “The Wall” in Hamilton was one I was keen to avoid again, and so I invested a few dollars in some small packets of energy gel. I forced one of the sweet, sugary things down my gullet just after tying my shoes (“forced” is an understatement, these things were disgusting) and minutes later set off on marathon number 3.
The first 10 kilometres took me from the suburbs in towards the city, worming along a well-used path against the Yarra River. I felt comfortable in the familiar environment, the murky brown water always to my left, and paid particular focus on absorbing the sights and sounds around me. The blasts of traffic, gusts of wind, and songs of birds all fought for the attention in my ears, but it was nothing I had not grown accustomed to hearing as a boy.
I quickly deduced that very little appeared to have since I’d left some years ago.
Around 7 kilometres in I detoured off the marathon course a short way to visit the Melbourne Cricket Ground. This giant sporting stadium boasted to be one of the largest in the world, attracting over 100,000 people to its most grand spectacles. I had spent many weekends here watching my own favourite team duke it out against their arch nemesis, and so I felt a surge of adrenaline as I arrived beneath the gigantic colosseum walls. I was a moth to a lamp when it came to this place and so there was no way I was going to avoid circling it beneath the vast shadows it cast across the promenade. On a barren on a weekday morning like this, the statues of immortalised sporting heroes stood proudly around the perimeter, and I tipped my head in recognition to a few of my favourites that had the most remarkable of stories.
Eventually I had to bid farewell and reluctantly pulled myself away to continue on deeper into the city. Past the casino I downed another gel and reached the end of the wharf at Southbank right as the watch hit 21 kilometres. After a few pictures of the gorgeous skyline, I turned down St Kilda Road towards Albert Park where a large lake sits just east of the city centre. Formula One fans will know this part well as the Grand Prix track, so I couldn’t help but try my hand at setting a new lap record around the lake.
By my calculations, I was just 25 minutes shy Michael Schumacher’s record of 1 minute and 24 seconds. Ah well, maybe next time.
Blustery winds started pushing me back as I turned down towards the beach. My legs may have been aching now, but I could see that these vomit-inducing gels were working as my energy was high, and I kept the pace going as I passed through the usual point in marathons where the Wall should have hit me in the face. With 7 kilometres left the Wall was still yet to hit, and I passed below the terrifying face of the Luna Park entranceway, careful to avoid it chomping down on me with its gaping mouth.
I downed the final gels. It was time to end this.
I switched on my “Pump Up” music playlist to really get me going. My heart throbbed harder at the sound of rock-n-roll blasting in my ears. Each step felt like a step away from a past doubt; a step to proving my old self that I could do more than I had once thought on this very stretch of beach. My legs were on their last strides now, and in the anxiety to be done with the pain I was checking my watch every few seconds:
42.0…
42.1…
42.2 kilometres.
It was done. I finished on the pier at St Kilda beach, feeling the sea breeze around my sweaty, salty body. I found a bench, sat and basked in the knowledge that I was now a different man to the one that left this city in 2018.
Reflection
It’s a funny thing, returning home.
I ran the same streets. I saw the same sights. I smelt the same smells. It was all familiar being back here, and yet in my heart it felt truly different. For most of the marathon I sat in memories of the last Angus who ran here. He was a different person entirely, a man of doubts, and yet today I had shown him clearly that we can achieve more than what we used to think.
I think back to the first morning with the Original Bootcamp Crew. I had a choice to make, a commitment to dedicate myself to. I had to put aside my anxieties and just take the leap into a world I knew nothing about.
Without that leap, I would not be here on the Hundred City Run.
It is so easy for us to judge ourselves against the next goal. The next achievement. The next target. Maybe that’s running a bit faster than yesterday. Or lifting something heavier than you did last week. Maybe it’s hitting a higher note in your singing lessons or writing a funnier joke for your next set. Maybe it’s a better report, a better quiche, a better sketch, a better everything. Yet we don’t give ourselves the credit for the journey to date. We don’t stop to look behind at who we used to be. By doing so, we deprive ourselves the chance to pat ourselves on the back, and say well done for what we have done so far. I was lucky to get that chance today, and now I feel more energised for the rest of this journey than I ever have so far.
So, if you get a moment today, don’t look ahead. Don’t think about tomorrow.
Look backwards.
Remember where you came from. Think about where you started. Celebrate it. Soak it in. Don’t discard your past accomplishments, no matter how trivial they are. At the time they were big because you had not done them yet. At the time they may have even seemed impossible, and yet now here you are past that line.
Reminding yourself again and again is a powerful tool for tomorrow.
The last time I was in Melbourne I had never run a marathon. Now, I sat on the beach having completed my third.
So, what do I think now when I look back to the start of this journey?
It’s a good thing I got dumped.
Comments