A Marathoner or Just Someone Who Runs Marathons?

Am I a marathon runner?  (Rhetorical question, no need to answer.)

I know we have all seen posts proclaiming that you don't need to run a certain speed, a particular distance or a set event to consider yourself a runner.  The bottom line in these messages is if you run, you are a runner.  And, I firmly believe that....  Well, "firmly" in a standing-in-four-inch-spikes-while-balancing-on-a-skateboard-on-the-deck-of-a-ship-in-the-midst-of-a-rolling-storm kind of way.  After all, I know a lot of people who run who I wouldn't consider runners.  

Sacrilege, you say!  Unsupportive snobbery, you say!  Perhaps.  But I do believe there is a world of difference between someone who runs - even daily - for exercise, but could take it or leave it, and the person who runs only three times a week but would go insane without it.  I know people of both varieties.  The latter I would firmly declare is a runner.  The former, I'm still a little unclear on.

You see, to me, a "runner" is someone who is kind of, sort of obsessed with it.  You know, someone who .... shhhh....don't say it out loud, someone who is maybe, perhaps, just a little bit addicted.  

Hmm, interesting.  I think I just answered my own question.  I was going to do this whole post on how while I feel I am a runner, I don't really consider myself a marathoner - how despite having done two marathons and almost completing a third (and having a fourth coming up!) I still can't quite bring myself to hang that moniker around my neck as easily as the finisher's medals I have received.  The ability eludes me, like trying to view something through a shifting fog.  I was going to throw that out to the world wide web and ask how can that be.  However, I think I just answered my own question.

I don't feel like a marathoner, because I am not addicted to them - yet.  I am obsessed with the idea of doing them, but I can't not live without them.  

This all came about as I was reading another person's blog post on how running a marathon - as opposed to a shorter distance - is a life-changing event.  How the commitment to training and sheer difficulty make the accomplishment of it transformative in a person's life.  Reading that, though, I was challenged.  With the few marathons I have run, I have failed to feel afterwards anywhere near the same transformative effect that I felt after running my first half marathon, and I wish I knew why.  Certainly, the marathons were harder.  Certainly, they were intimidating.  Certainly, there was a level of commitment that just can't be matched by a half marathon training program. But, the truth is that I felt more transformed, more in awe of having done that first half marathon, than I ever did with either marathon.  

Maybe my inability to call myself a marathoner has to do with the fact that I know I can do more, but I am not addicted to them.  They have never called to me like running in general does.  After running my first half marathon, I was hooked.  I wanted to keep running.  I wanted to do more.  It wasn't easy.  God knows, it's never been easy or come easily, but I wanted to keep at it, keep plugging away.  After the marathon, meh....take it or leave it.  

Like an avid runner who can switch to the elliptical or a CrossFit class at any time, I can drop from a marathon without much thought.  The idea doesn't devastate me.

However, slowly, a transformation is taking place.  I don't know if a marathon will ever give me that big transformative effect or feeling of awe back - the one I felt after my first half marathon, and the one I felt after doing the Pikes Peak Ascent - but the idea has gotten hold of my brain that I want to do more of these things.  I want to work for them more.  I don't want to throw in the towel.  Maybe as my ability catches up with my desires, I am slowly becoming more addicted to running 26.2.  And, maybe then, I will be able to call myself comfortably and without hesitation a marathoner.

Either that, or I should quit now while there is still time.

Happy Running!