On my post race report on The California Interational Marathon, Lucho posited the following question:

Nice job! Did you examine any mental aspects of the last 10k of the race? Looking back on it could you have run harder? I’m curious is all.. I think the central governor theory (law imo)is interesting. Did your brain protect your body with a message to slow down?

It’s a question that I had asked myself the next morning, flying back to Denver. My High School Track Coach would always tell us that the mind gives out before the body, I imagine that’s true, but it’s hard to tell yourself that when it’s 400 meters to go in the 1600.

I remember a few times, in the final mile or two when someone would pass me and I’d tell myself to hang with them for just a block. I’d pick up the pace and suddenly realize that my hurting body didn’t want to move any faster and I would slow back down. One thing I’ve discovered about myself and it’s probably true with most runners is that you’re willing to put yourself through a lot more pain when you know that you’re having a good race. In general, if I know that I am running a subpar race, I sort of mentally check out at the end of the race, but if I know that I am close to a PR or having a good race, then I am willing to fight it out that last mile and kick to the finish.

But back to the question, it’s so hard to know. I tried to push myself a few times and I seriously think that my body couldn’t move any faster. At that point in the race my quads were sore and cold, I just couldn’t get the legs to turnover. I even knew that I was going to run a PR and I knew that a “fast time” was fallling from my grasp, after each and every mile.

I’d like to tell you a story that ties into Lucho’s Central Governor Theory. In College, there was this kid on the track team, his name was Lee. Lee was a nice guy, but a bit slow mentally and I don’t mean that in a negative way, he literally had a learning disability. The kid worked his ass off just to get through college, his Mom proof read all of his papers and a paper that would have taken me two hours to write would have taken Lee eight hours. Lee also ran track and cross country, in track he was probably the worst 1500 meter runner on the team. My sophomore year he ran around a 4:30, 1500 meters.

One spring day, Lee was entered into the 1500 meters, I also ran the 1500 and I believe that my fastest time my sophomore year was a 4:17, remember this is D3, so nothing impressive. That meet, I was not running the 1500, but Lee was and somehow he ended up in the fast heat and not the slow heat. I’m not sure if Coach messed something up, or what happened, but there was Lee in the fast heat with all the guys who probably ran <4:10.

Well the race started and there was Lee with his unorthodox running style, arms pumping furiously, doing everything he could to hang on to the back of the pack. Going into the third lap, the pack starts to split apart and Lee was in last place, but hanging on to the guy in second to last place. Bell lap, 400 meters to go, Lee was still giving it everything he had and trying to hang on to the guy in second to last place. On the home stretch the guy in second to last place starts to pull away, but Lee was giving it his all. He had that look of complete, 100% pain on his face, he crossed the finish line in last place, running a 4:16, he PR'd by 14 seconds, running a 1500 meters, which is huge.

He crossed the finish line and literally collapsed to the ground. They had to carry him off the track to the trainers area, Lee didn't know who he was or where he was at, he was completely exhausted. It was amazing, I still think about that day and I am positive in my 16 years of running that I have never pushed myself to that point of hurt. So yeah, I'm sure that your mind gives out way before your body, but how do you trick it to push harder?

I think about guys like Lance Armstrong or Steve Prefontaine, put their mind in my/your body, how much faster would you be? Often times while running, I think about Lance and his infamous move on Jan Ulrich on Alpe D' Huez in the Tour De France back in 2001, seen here, one of my favorite Youtube clips. I love it for numerous reasons, but look at Ulrich’s face, he is in so much pain and then Lance just takes off. However, you have to realize that Lance had to have been in a good amount of pain as well, but he was able to ante up and leave Ulrich in the dust.

While walking back to our Hotel, I asked my friend Nate, who just ran a 2:51 Marathon. “Hey Nate, do you think if I gave you $100 to run a sub seven minute mile right now, that you could do it?” At this point, both him and I are limping back to the Hotel, legs incredible sore, we both concluded that we didn’t think it was possible for either of us. But the unanswered question was, what was our price point? In other words, how much would have have had to have been offered to get us to make an attempt? My guess is that it would have taken at least $500 for me to even give it a go.

In Economics, you learn that incentives matter. If I had Bill Gate’s Money, I’d love to run some crazy experiments. I probably ran the final mile of my marathon in around 7:30, if not slower. What if someone offered me $10k if I could run that final mile at race pace, which was 6:40, could I have done it then? Maybe, it would have motivated me, that’s for sure.

Thus, back to me having Bill Gate’s type money. I’d offer up some crazy experiments, just to see if large sums of cash could push people to extreme levels of pain/faster times in running. Thus, I have the RunColo Marathon and I stand at mile 26 of the marathon and if I point the $ sign at you, you get $1k for every runner you pass in the final .2 miles, it would be pretty funny/cool to see it in work, firing people up, etc. Plus, the crowds would love it!

Or even simple stuff, let’s say you just ran a 20:00 5k and it’s a PR for you. I come out and say, I will give you $10k if you can run a 19:40 next week, on your own, same course. Be interesting to see how many people could do it, if money was on the line.

Ok, I don’t need money to push me to run a PR, I am motivated enough to do that on my own. My point is simply what if you were offered some crazy incentives to push yourself harder than you ever have before, how would you respond?