Who Am I?

I am an avid runner and have been running since I was 15 years old. I began running low to medium distances while on my high school track team, running the 800 meter and 1600 meter races (I was a sub 5 miler and a 2 minute 800 runner). In addition to the track team, I also joined the cross country team. After high school I still wanted to run and decided to start doing road races. I have probably ran a couple hundred 5k races (16.29 PR)along with many 10k's as well. In 2009 I decided to step up my game and try to tackle my first marathon. I will be honest; the only reason I did this was because my father ran a few and I wanted to show him that I could do what he did. I trained poorly for my first one and regret it. If you are going to run a race, train like you want to win. I still continue to run marathons and other distances as well, and every race is a chance for me to better myself.
I started this blog to hopefully communicate with other runners and to shed any knowledge I may have about the sport that can help other runners. I believe running is the best sport and can be a great stress reliever. I encourage all runners to spread the word of our sport and show people why running is so good and why the community of runners has such great people. You can follow me on twitter @byrne1324 or find me on facebook- Shaun Byrne

Wednesday, July 15, 2015

The Never Quit Mentality

I am sure by now most of you have heard the name Scott Jurek. Scott recently just set the record for hiking the Appalachian Trail in 46 days, 8 hours. If doing all 2,189 miles in that amount of time isn't impressive enough then throw in the fact that he tweaked his knee early into the journey. Still not impressed? Now throw in the fact that he had to over compensate for his knee issue and ended up hurting his quad, all in the first week. What an inspiration, what heart and mental strength it must of taken to complete this journey.

Scott Jurek is just one person who has the "Never Quit" mentality, A mentality that I have come accustomed to during my training. It wasn't running though that made me realize that sometimes if you don't give up great things can happen. About 7 years ago me and my friends decided to play in a new roller hockey league. We went from playing with a ball to playing with a puck, on top of that half of our team was my friends that just started playing a year earlier or so. Our first game we ended up getting destroyed 10-1. We all had our heads hung low and thought we may have bitten off more than we could chew. The next game we ended up winning, and as the season went on we started to click. We weren't the best team out there and we knew that, but we also knew that we had more heart than any other team. If a team wanted to beat us they were going to have to out work us both ends of the rink. We made the playoffs and ended up in the championship game against the team that beat us at the beginning of the season. Once again we played with hearts and never gave up. We ended up winning 5-4, and won the championship. We won as a team, it took everyone not to quit for us to win. Everyone stepped up when we needed them too and to this day that is the best championship I have ever won. It's the best because we won by playing with our heart, we weren't the best but we believed in ourselves and never quit.


Over the past year I have gotten inspired by so many of my running friends and their "Never Quit" mentality.  Nichole who has recently came back from injury is just one person. She never quit and just gave up. When she couldn't run she was still at the gym working hard. Jennifer and Amanda were like myself who set out on a journey to run Pittsburgh in certain times and all of us didn't have the race we wanted, but no one gave up and all of us have already registered for other races for redemption. There are so many other runners that are out there that inspire me and have the "Never Quit" mentality, they all show what having heart is all about. If I could pick a team of runners these would be the people I would choose. We may not be the best, but you are going to get a group of runners that don't the meaning of quit.  If there is anyone who is reading this and has ever doubted their self and their ability, remember it doesn't matter how long it takes you to reach your goal all that matters is that you get to the finish.
NEVER QUIT

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4 comments:

  1. Gretchen BraunJuly 16, 2015 at 7:47 AM

    Thanks for sharing this! Reading stories like this is always so inspiring to me. Makes me feel like such a wimp for stopping to walk if I have a cramp or I'm out of breath. Such a wuss! Never quit- love that as a mantra.

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  2. UnknownJuly 16, 2015 at 9:55 AM

    Gretchen don't ever take walking as being a wimp, you are still moving forward.quitting would be stopping completely and just throwin in the towel. Never quit is a great mantra and one that I use a lot.

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  3. NicholeJuly 18, 2015 at 5:09 PM

    Aw, thanks for the shout out, Shaun - that means a lot. I agree - you can't give up. Yeah you're gonna have setbacks and hurdles to overcome but as long as you just keep going you'll get to where you want and need to be. That video brought me to tears... that's awesome. It kind of reminds me when I felt my bone give out during the EQT... I was finishing that thing no matter what!

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    Replies
    1. UnknownJuly 18, 2015 at 5:18 PM

      If only more people had your attitude Nichole. You really are an inspiration for anyone that says they can't do it

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