10/13/2025
After 26.2 miles, 5 hours 57 minutes, I’ve completed not only my first marathon ever but also… THE marathon, the Chicago Marathon… one of the Global 7!
This city has taught me the definition of grit, resilience, and so much more. This marathon encapsulates these teachings.
Accomplishing this has truly altered my brain chemistry forever. Not only in having to cleanse my body of substances for me to train properly, the reset back to baseline dopamine levels I experienced as a result of this; not just in the physical transformation and the level of fitness I am now at; and not just the race itself and being able to finish within my goal….. But also… something that happened during the race that I can only describe as a moment of synchronicity.
Far too unlikely to be a simple coincidence, in the last few grueling miles of the race, I found a simple bracelet on the ground that read “Never Give Up”. This was a phrase my late father (grandfather) and I shared. In his final years it became so much more than just a phrase, more like a lifelong mantra and ideology for me. And even as the Alzheimer’s slowly ended his life, he truly never gave up… He stayed with us as long as he could.
I firmly believe he delivered this to me in a moment of the race when I needed it most. A race with over 50,000 runners and far more in attendance, I happen to run across this bracelet despite the width and length of this course, the sea of debris throughout and around it, and all other countless factors that may have prevented me from receiving it… I happen to see it on the ground and recognize it as something of importance.
There is so much more to this world than what we think we know or understand. Set goals, achieve them. Love you all.