Lessons from a First-Time Marathoner: Meet Intern Matt

Intern Matt (also known as my good friend Matt Kulling) joins me over a beer at Murphy's Bleachers in Chicago just one day after he ran the 2018 Chicago Marathon. He was not a runner before July and so I decided to catch up with my buddy about what he learned from his first marathon. Why did he sign up to do this? What was the hardest part of training? What were the highs and lows of the actual race? Would he ever do it again? Here's what he said, when I asked him what he learned from this whole process. "It doesn't really matter if you run in 2:04 or if you run in 6:04, people will cheer you on the same amount. This is me kind of patting myself on the back but it's a tremendous accomplishment to just finish or even say that I'm going to do this at all. It's a self-imposed goal. The fact that people are so supportive of you – if you have to walk, it doesn't matter. If you're really old, it doesn't matter. If you're really young, it doesn't matter. People really rally around you and that's what I thought was cool about seeing you run Berlin and London and now something I experienced in Chicago." Congrats, Matt.