Nervousness of the Sprint Runner

I watched the men's 100m final in the World Athletic Championship. It was so intense! Imagine you have been preparing for this race for years, and it is over in less than 10 seconds. I cannot even begin to guess what goes through the athlete's mind at the starting line. Good thing it doesn't matter how you start in the marathon. Actually the worst thing you could possible do in a marathon is to start too fast. Moreover nowadays all the races adopt the "net time" (that is, the countdown doesn't start when the race starts, but they only start counting your time after you have crossed the starting line). Anyway the start is always jam-packed, so I always trot to the starting line. I am very grateful for this - I cannot imagine how nervous I would feel if I were a sprint runner (even though I had no chance; at school I was the slowest sprinter in the class in a bad year. In a good year I was the second from the last!)

Today: 12 miles
This week: 12 miles