You want it then you get it! Motivation story.

Letter written by my coach Javier Suárez after my first half marathon in 2017.

https://www.instagram.com/xplora_training_team/

Sometimes we express emotions and experiences lived through social networks, which really fall short with words for a space theme. Here I allow myself to tell the story of one of my athletes who has surprised me, not because of his ability, but because he has left a life lesson that I understand could serve any runner. This young man participated in the recent Santiago Late race, leaving us with a lump in the throat to those who know his story, which I will tell you here.

Rancell Tapia is the brother of Raúl Tapia, a cyclist who died in Santiago last July. For Rancell, his brother was his role model, both personally and athletically.

What I witnessed in Santiago Late was like seeing in flesh and blood what I read in the book “How bad do you want it”. Many times “more or less” (kinda) we want something, and when the moment of truth comes, we throw in the towel. We can be close to our goal, and there are various scenarios when things get complicated, go on, stop, give everything, try halfway. So I ask, how much do you want it? If your life depended on it, would you also give up? (I doubt it).

It is not that we should treat each training / repetition / race as if our life was at stake, if we do so, the time would come when we look for a health problem or injury, when the body really cannot take it anymore or we have pain . But between “your life depends on it”, and between “oh, I’m tired”, there are many grays.

How much do you want to make a personal record (PR), how much do you want to make a new distance or discipline, how much do you want to shut someone’s mouth?

“Medium” do you want it? Or do you want it more than anything?

As long as I’m a coach, I won’t tire of using Rancell as an example. During training, he performed the funds at 6:10–6:40, on flat routes and starting earlier than the Santiago Late day. The test he carried out in May estimated him in a time of 2:03–2:05 in a half marathon, in similar conditions (flat and relatively little heat). I know he gave everything in the test because I was there when he finished.

Rancell missed one of the most important weeks of training due to the brother’s death. For all these reasons, it was that I was left without an answer when he told me that he would try to break the two hours (the pace should be 5:41). But as I said in the post, I did not discuss it because he knew his motivation (also it was not that he told me that he would try to break the world record). He considered that it was something that was out of his reach (although not by much, since there he would have tried to prevent him from taking any health risk).

The first lesson Rancell gave us was that when you really want it, there is no excuse. Two weeks before the race, Rancell made his 16k fund in A STREET OF 200 METERS !!!, that is, WTF !. Don’t believe me, believe Strava:

Well, nothing, the day of the race came, Danilo, Jenny and I left at 5 am from Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic) just to see Rancell arrive, any time. When we arrived, the clock read around 1:40, so we settled down as two hours approached. When the clock read 1:59, he had a mixture of thoughts:

• Will ir arrive before two hours?
• Maybe you tried too hard and can’t finish.
• Will it arrive after two hours and be disappointed by the result?
• Should I get that idea out of my mind?

At the start of the race, he made the first 2 kms at 5:09 min/km and 5:16 min/km (a perfect recipe for disaster), but even so, he drew strength I do not know where, and remained close to the average pace that brought him closer to two hours.

Finally, the clock ticked 2:00:00 (he still had several seconds for the start time versus the chip time), and it was there that we saw Rancell, turning at the last corner to cross the finish line at 1:59:14 . The screams and tears of Rancell and of all of us who lived through that moment will be recorded forever.

Here is Rancell’s career, he accomplished his goal on a highly demanding route and in a race that started at 6 AM:

This serves as a reflection for all of us. What is our excuse? … Rancell’s words: “The truth is that I only did it for someone, someone who taught me that there are no excuses to achieve what we propose.”

Again, “medium” do you want it? Or do you want it more than anything?