We've got a motto here-you're tougher than you think you are, and you can do more than you think you can.

There is a growing subculture of barefoot runners, people who got rid of their shoes. And what they have found uniformly is you get rid of the shoes, you get rid of the stress, you get rid of the injuries and the ailments.

Know why people run marathons? …Because running is rooted in our collective imagination, and our imagination is rooted in running. Language, art, science; space shuttles, Starry Night, intravascular surgery; they all had their roots in our ability to run. Running was the superpower that made us human — which means its a superpower all humans posses.

Try the meditation of the trail, just walk along looking at the trail at your feet and don't look about and just fall into a trance as the ground zips by," Kerouac wrote. "Trails are like that: you're floating along in a Shakespearean Arden paradise and expect to see nymphs and fluteboys, then suddenly you're struggling in a hot broiling sun of hell in dust and nettles and poison oak... just like life.

Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up, it knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve. It doesn't matter whether you're the lion or a gazelle-when the sun comes up, you'd better be running.

Running should be free, man.

We were born to run; we were born because we run.