The Realities of High Performance

I’ve been inspired and in awe at some of the athletic performances of late – so many tales from the London Marathon, Cocadona250, IRONMAN, and more, and have been thinking about writing about these. The human stories, and the growth and development of sport.

And then I thought of my own impressive performance this weekend, and why not share that.

(Just for the ‘lost in translation’ amongst us, the above sentence is written with British sarcasm and you’ll see why! Read on.)

Saturday night, and I was working with the BCC team, in the studio, behind the scenes for IRONMAN 70.3 Aix en Provence. I had driven to the Coot Lake in the afternoon with Koru to tire him out, swimming and chasing the ball. No issues.

Just a few hours later I drove Koru around to a friend’s house (let’s call her Michelle) for his sleepover whilst I was working overnight. The car made a bit of a splutter and jerk as it started, but it did start and I dropped Koru off. When I then tried to start the car to get home… nothing. Dead. Kaput. Nada. My friend (Michelle) who had already jumped into her PJs, and was in bed in the space of me dropping Koru and walking back down her drive to my car. (Note: Her drive is not a mile long driveway, but just your normal short distance from the front door to the sidewalk (or pavement for my non American friends). Anyway, Michelle kindly drove me, in her car back home, as unfortunately her car isn’t able to jump start others. But anyway. So, once I was back home, I ordered an Uber to then take me into the studios. Once we’d finished recording, I Uber’d back – and who knew Uber was more expensive at 0515hrs on a Sunday morning than at 9pm on a Saturday night! (There went a couple of hours of my work too!)

I then walked back to my Michelle’s house to collect Koru, and on the route texted another friend, (let’s call him Mike) to see if he was free and able to come and help me jump start my car. Fortunately, at 7am on a Sunday morning, he was, and he kindly came to my rescue. The positive of this is, that I’ve never actually jump started a car. I have the leads, but have never gone through the process, so this was a great learning and feel more confident going forward.

The engine kicked into gear! Wahoo! And I drove straight to Autozone (not sponsored, other battery replacement, automotive part shops are available). I was paranoid on the way that I’d get a red light, and car would shut down on ‘autostop’ and I’d be stuck in the middle of a road. So, I tried to time every light and every turn, to get green, this meant slowing down early for a red light, and slowly crawling forward, not allowing the car to stop, until the light turned green and I could proceed (of course with care and caution, as is the Highway Code)!

I made it to the battery shop, who confirmed my battery was dead, bad, and needed to be replaced. Doh!

However, they weren’t able to do it themselves, because too many parts needed removed. Or as Mike said is it because “it’s a fancy design”. I mean it’s not like I have a flash car, it’s a MINI countryman, but I guess, yes, it’s too complicated for your normal battery repair place.

I then asked them to jump start me again, so that I could drive home, but instead of driving home. I drove straight to the garage, over the road from my apartment and pulled up in a parking bay in front of the garage, very aware of the “Unauthorized vehicles will be towed” signs all around.

So, I thought, I’d write a couple of notes and put them on the car, asking not to be towed and explain the situation, and that I’d be back first thing when they opened. I put one note under my windscreen wiper on the front, and another under the rear windscreen wiper, again slightly worried someone would remover the notes, and then someone remove my car.

And yes, here is the moment of genius you’ve been waiting for…

it genuinely never occurred to me, until a few hours later, when it was now raining, so my worry of the notes being removed, was added to with them disintegrating in the rain, but no, it never occurred to me until this moment – to put the note inside the car on the dash board!

Right! Seriously! It worries me that I’m not sure how I survive in this world sometimes!

Fortunately, with the garage just being over the road, I wrote a new note, and walked over to place it inside the car, and only had a mild panic rounding the corner of the garage and thinking for a split second my car had been towed! Lol

You’ll have to wait now in suspense to see if when I write my next substack…

Was the car towed or not?

Did I get a new battery?

Do you really give a shit?

dun dun deeeeeeeerrrr (said in that creepy, scary movie voice/drum type vibe!)

So, let’s go back to some true high performances over the past couple of weeks.

He came, He Sawe, He Conquered – I still had to use this heading. I would love to claim it, but it isn’t mine, so want to give credit to an actual journalist, Sean Ingle. But it’s in reference to Sebastian Sawe winning The London Marathon, and doing so in under 2hours. The first man (or woman) to run sub 2hours in a competitive race (e.g. not the Nike Breaking 2 project). Also, to Yomif Kejelcha. Can you imagine, in your debut marathon, breaking the previous course record, breaking the World Record, and then seeing you broke the illusive 2hours mark, yet you came second! Kiplomo, who finished third, also broke the previous world record, but sadly is relatively forgotten with Sawe’s and Kejelcha’s performance.

In the women’s race, we also saw World Records being broken, with the winner, Tigst Assefa running 2:15:41. This is a women’s only world record, which means it was a women’s only race, no men or male pacers, just women racing and female pacers. It was just as exciting if not more so, from a race perspective, as there were still three women running together until Assefa kick with about 400m to go. Hellen Obiri couldn’t go with her, to finish in second 2:15:53, with Joyciline Jepkosgei in third, 2:15:55. The women set out at a much faster pace (relatively), slowing slightly in the later stages, but also possible as it started to come down to tactics of Assefa and Obiri. Assefa won in London in 2025, but for Obiri it was her first time running in London. Obiri normally known for racing New York or Boston, coming to London to take on a different style of course, and looking more than capable to take the win in future years! Perhaps some good battles to be head. It is a slight shame that Assefa’s world record, will go almost unnoticed with the euphoria of Sawe breaking sub 2hours.

I have to admit I have not run any of the Major Marathons. Well, that’s a lie, I did run Sydney Marathon back in 2009 when I’d just started triathlon and had stupidly, like most complete beginners, signed up for an Ironman, and my coach thought we needed to do a marathon before the marathon in the Ironman. To be fair, I think I did too. So, I did Sydney, but it wasn’t part of the Majors back then. So, I haven’t actually run any of the Majors, and therefore probably am not in a position to comment, but, (well what is substack and social media for if not too impart our views on other people) I do feel London kicks ass! I think this is probably a completely biased view from being British. But the whole city just comes out for the day. The whole route is lined with supporters, cheering, supporting, clapping, singing, dancing, everything. If that doesn’t restore your faith in humanity, I’m not sure what will. A lot of these crowds don’t even know anyone running, but just come out to support and be part of it!

London, I think is special, because it attracts a huge number of people who run for charity, but also in fancy dress (*costume for my USA readers, not black tie fancy). So, apart from being the biggest marathon in the world from competitor numbers, it’s also the largest annual one-day fundraising event in the world. In 2025 the race set a new record of £87.3million, and early, unconfirmed reports suggest the 2026 event may have even surpassed this to top £95million.

Some of the costumes are insane too. A lot for charity, and a lot for to get the Guinness World Record, for the fastest person running as…. “ INSERT RANDOM ATTIRE”. There’s always someone dressed as a Rhino, running for “Save the Rhinos”. Iain Grigor completed the fastest marathon dress as a train (male); Simon Fannon, knitted the longest scarf whilst running a marathon, 5.59m of scarf in 5:48:08. I guess the slower you go the longer the scarf! Reef Rounding (yes that’s his real name for a start), broke the record for the fastest marathon dresses as a camera! A guy ran 3:21:42 for the fastest marathon wearing a suit and dress shoes! And wait for it… Harley Smith ran a 2:47:42… wearing clogs! WTF! Daddy Pig (for my little readers – IYKYK) also ran.

Then there are stories like Jordan, who ran with a fridge on his back! Yes that’s right. Running with a 25kg fridge on his back. Jordan Adams and his brother Cian, both carry a rare gene for frontotemporal dementia – the same condition that took their mum, Geraldine, at just 52. Jordan was and is running to raise awareness for the disease, knowing he and his brother could potentially lose their lives to dementia in the next 10-15years. He has, after London, gone on to Ireland to continue running marathons and raising awareness and money.

There are countless other stories, as moving as Jordan’s too.

A performance that may have gone unnoticed was the incredible pacing that Alex Yee did. Yee the Paris Olympic Gold medalist in triathlon, and also a 2:06:38 marathoner himself, paced a group of British men through halfway in 63:15 which was exactly to the second the time set out pre race. He then carried on through to 28.15km in a time of 1:23:50 which is 2:59/km- or around 2:06 for the full.

Another performance recently that left me glued to my TV for 5 days, pretty much straight, was Cocadona 250. A 250mile point to point ultramarathon in Arizona, with only 40,000feet of elevation gain. It starts in Sonoran Desert near Black Canyon City, and takes runners across rugged terrain to the finish line in Flagstaff. In just over 56hours, 56hours, 9minutes and 48seconds to be exact, Rachel Entrekin, crossed the line, not just being the first female across the line and lowering her own course record by over 7hours, but being the first person, female or male, to cross the line, and setting the overall course record, beating the 2025 men’s course record as well! She was over an hour ahead of 2^nd place, the first placed male. She slept for just 19mins across the two and a half days (approx.) She also had a dialed in crew, knowing exactly their role and responsibility at aid stations. From measuring out every empty gel wrapper, checking ever bottle to see how much she’d drunk in order to calculate the number of calories that Rachel had taken, and how many she would need for the next stop. It was impressive to say the least, and perhaps also an indication of just how friggin awesome women can be if we invest fully in them, and give them the support and means to perform to their best and equal to their male counterparts.

There’s a really great podcast with Rachel - Rest Day, The Freetrail Podcast

It’s fascinating to listen to her mindset and thoughts about the race.

and I’ll just leave you with one of her thoughts…

“Why not me?” - someone has to win, so “why not you?”

“Why not try?”