This is classic victim mentality. Support is not the reason you didn't make it to the top.
This is classic victim mentality. Support is not the reason you didn't make it to the top.
By Working A Job wrote:
. . . Great example of doing both is Martin Hehir who's in medical school . . .
“Ultimately, I felt like I could do more during a day.” -- Martin Hehir.
(Explaining why he gave up the pro-runner lifestyle in Flagstaff to go to med school.)
https://www.runnersworld.com/runners-stories/a25134988/martin-hehir-runs-through-med-school/To preface this, I do not receive very much active/monetary support from my parents save the following things: 1. they paid for my education, so I have no debt. Things would be much much different if I had debt. 2. I am still on their health insurance, my company does not provide any. 3. They covered half of a cheap (
I'm probably considered on the slow side of sub elite but I train 3 hours a day and travel to big/medium races (2:21 marathoner) I'm self employed doing accounting, the days are long (and the money's okay) but I can always get my runs in. During the week, I hardly interact with my significant other and I don't see any friends. I know it's not for ever and I want to reach my goals, that's what keeps me going.
Wow I just wrote a really long post and totally forgot letsrun does not handle the less than sign. Maybe I will try again later.
About 50-60% of the faster runners I know (we'll say 2:23 and under for men) are high-school or middle-school XC/track coaches. Seems like an easy job, allows you to get your jogging in with the team, and teams like to hire faster guys.
The next 20-30% are unemployed (live at home) or (more likely) work in a running store/other retail.
The last 10% (ish) of this group (I'm in Chicago, so there's a fair number) work "real" jobs: consultant, attorney, investment-banking, etc. No physicians, but you can imagine there could be.
I appreciate it may be different in a non-major city.
They think Boulder is cheap until they move there, all because of rumors they heard living on the coasts
Victim my ass
Bet I was faster than you...
That was while working 12 hours a day loading trucks and packing fish.
I mean seriously!
Long long long timer wrote:
Victim my ass
Bet I was faster than you...
That was while working 12 hours a day loading trucks and packing fish.
I mean seriously!
Somebody call the waaambulance. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.
A lot of the guys who go pro from Ivy's live off daddy's credit card (Kyle Merber) or a trust fund until they get some sort of partial sponsorship.
Hello everyone, I’ve been stalking the forums for a while. For the past year, my partner and I train daily and work full time. For the past year, we wake up at 3:30 am M-F and lift (she’s more of a lifter). We finish at 4:20 then we run the dog for 2 miles and bring the dog back. Then we run for 3.1 miles by ourselves. After work, she runs 2 miles by her self and lifts. After school, I run 7-8 miles. I don’t lift again. On the weekends, we don’t lift, but continue our routine. We run daily. We run all of our miles at 7:30 pace. We don’t do workouts. She does 50 miles per week. I am around 70-80 (I cut back a bit because I don’t want to go over 80 miles per week. We sleep at 9 pm. She’s an engineer, I’m a medical student. Goal is to build our base through the Spring and ease in workouts and some 5K races. We’re between 27-25 years of age. In HS, I ran 4:45 for the 1600 m and 10:20 for the 3200 on less than 30 miles a week. Gave up routine running for almost 10 years for pre-med and medical school. Started from stratch over a year ago. Built up from 14 miles a week. Helpful things are that we live in the South (warmer, can always run outside). Goal is to get the OQT by 2024. If not, we’ll be damn good runners and healthy. If you are motivated, you can do it.
HRE wrote:
If all else fails they can always get a job. That's what everyone did in the amateur era. I'm not sure why people think you can't do this. Bill Rodgers best marathon when he was working as a special ed teacher was 2:09:55. His best time as a professional runner was 2:09:26. ...
Didn't Bill R once say "no man with a full time job will ever beat me"?
Allegedly living on food stamps while winning Boston
Pre—living in trailer up on wood blocks
We need to support our runners and our people better.
Rowdy Gaines swimmer had hard knock story too I seem to recall...don’t quote me tho
I’m sure there are countless others
subway sandwich elite wrote:
Wow I just wrote a really long post and totally forgot letsrun does not handle the less than sign. Maybe I will try again later.
So whatever plugin sanitizes the input can't tell the difference between one less than sign and an actual tag. Makes you wonder about the rest of the site. Don't reuse your LRC password kids.
Wow. A joke if ever there was one. Basic income so people who want to run but aren't good enough to get paid enough to live can do it anyway. May as well pay everyone to do whatever they want. May as well have open borders, too, so the American taxpayers are paying for anyone who shows up here. Exactly where has this worked in human history? You realize that the US has a population of well over 300 million, right?
Workin at the Car Wash Blues
https://money.usnews.com/careers/slideshows/12-best-part-time-jobs-to-pay-the-bills
"Well I had just out of the county jail doin 90 days for non-support..."
possible answers ... wrote:
Possible answers:
1) One or more are trust fund kids.
2) One or more are not necessarily trust fund kids, but parents decide to fund the dream.
3) One or more is supported by a spouse or significant other.
4) Possible successful gambler and/or day trader. [This is highly doubtful.]
5) A half a dozen individuals live Spartan lives in a small rented house. Everyone works a part-time job. All share everything.
6) Engage in illegal activities. [Less likely than true.]
Outside of the US, most countries have an unemployment benefit (dole) which will be circa $250-300 a week in the local western currency. They will have say degrees in business, exercise, education but they will spend years working part time as a dry needler, masseuse, fitness trainer etc where they make up an extra $200-250 per week. Most of these almost elites will become conmen in that they will get free gym memberships to expensive heath facilities on the agreement that they promote them on their instagram and Facebook accounts. Free everything. They will get free nutritional supplements from some start up. They'll be sponsored, but not by Nike or Adidas, no it'll be Hoka, Ultra, Asics, Mizuno, Saucony even New Balance. Western athletes that do qualify but make major finals are really in the same position as those who nearly qualify as East African dominance of running has reduced the margin cost of an elite runner below western sustainability (look at the cost of a house in the UK since the time of Coe vs Ovett, a 20-30 fold increase).
For real. A 9-5 is great if you can keep the mental stress low. Very manageable to get a workout in before work with a 5 am wakeup, 5:45-6 am start time, 7:30am finish, and get situated to leave for work by 8:30. Plus the evening for strength work or double. Lots of respect to all the 2:20 guys who pull this off week after week.
ok... trying again.
To preface this, I do not receive very much active/monetary support from my parents save the following things: 1. they paid for my education, so I have no debt. Things would be much much different if I had debt. 2. I am still on their health insurance, my company does not provide any. 3. As a gift last year, they covered half of a cheap (less than $3000) used car that I was fully financially ready to buy.
Also I am not a marathoner. Track guy.
I have been working a job that pays in the mid 30K's for the past few years. It's not a lot, but it pays the bills and allows me to save for retirement too. I get free shoes from a local store. I live very simply/frugally in the suburbs of a major east coast city in a 2bd apartment with my SO and one other roommate that is at a price point where I found 0 equivalents in Boulder, a few in flagstaff, and many in eugene. The apartment is pretty old and has some slightly dated appliances, but I like it, it gets the job done and is one of the better deals in the area, I think. Despite having a car, I use public transportation every day to save time, money, and stress. I pretty much only use the car to run errands and travel to races, sometimes to go out and do a fun thing on the weekends. The car has been handy for several road trips (both running-related and non-running-related). I eat out maybe once a week and brew my own coffee at home, since people love to talk about how millenials spend $5 on a latte or avocado toast every day or whatever.
I run both before work and after work, which is mostly just a drag when it's been a super stressful day, or it is dark/snowing out. It took a while to get used to that routine though. It's definitely not ideal, mentally tough at times, but certainly not impossible. I have access to a nearby treadmill in case the conditions are truly horrible.
My first several months with my job, I focused on building my emergency fund and minimizing my spending. On a good month, I would only spend about $1000-$1100 between rent, utilities, food, public transport pass, etc. combined, so that allowed me to save up several hundred dollars a month towards an emergency fund, so it grew pretty fast. I also started saving for retirement not long after. Since getting those two things squared away, that has led to me having some extra cash piling up in my checking account (plus I made about $2k in prize money this year, which was a big surprise for me), I have felt much more comfortable living my life. I am not struggling. I am getting by, with a comfortable amount of room for error/risks/splurging on going to a meet I think I gotta go to, or something nice I want to buy, etc.
Do I still sometimes worry about how several of my peers are moving along in their careers while I am kind of putting everything on hold (my current job is definitely not a career path I want to work towards)? yes, sometimes. Do I wish I was sponsored, so I could focus fully on training every day? So I could do both my runs in daylight every day? So I could get some time to go to the gym and lift? Get into all the best meets and have travel and lodging for them covered? Yes, that would be nice, but if I never get to that point, I will be okay with it. I have already accomplished several of my running goals, and when I take a step back, I am really "living that life"... Enjoying life and enjoying running (fast) while I am in the prime of my ability to both run fast and enjoy life. You know? Supporting yourself doesn't mean your running needs to suffer (unless the only job you can get is brutal manual labor). A lot of things that make supporting yourself work (responsible time and money management and a good routine) will help make your running better too. So I would say that being an unsponsored, working sub-elite isn't that crazy. It's not ideal if you want to be actual world-class competitive, so depending on what goals you set for yourself (do the best you can, so you will improve slowly but surely, vs squeeze every possible ounce of improvement out of your body and run the new IAAF standards) it's definitely doable, and not completely crazy/miserable to be a "modern sub-elite" you might say.
If I had to hang up my spikes today, I would be happy with the career I had. If I had to continue working my dead end job doing this for another 2 years still unsponsored, still sub-elite, and then hang up my spikes, I think I would still be happy. another 2 years after that.... ok maybe then I might feel a little bad about getting a late start on an actual career.
I don't think being sub-elite means having to suffer/struggle through your early 20's. You can get by pretty comfortably if you are reasonable about your finances, and learn to step back and enjoy running as much as you can, while you are still young and fast.
"If the grass is greener on the other side, it's because you're not watering your own grass."
There are too many individual factors in a person's life to compare. Why does this bother you? And for the record, every non-professional, but elite runner I know has some sort of income, so not sure where you're getting your stats. What seems to help is having a job that allows some flexibility, as well as a supportive spouse/S.O. if applicable.