Coaches know that a parent publicly scolding his kid after a race will not help the athlete perform better.

No doubt a brain and some shoes are essential for marathon success, although if it comes down to a choice, pick the shoes. More people finish marathons with no brains than with no shoes.

The key to running a good marathon is to not listen to anyone's advice the last week before the race. That's when people tend to do stupid things that disrupt all the input and training of the previous months.

Prior to the 1976 Olympics, I was a 5,000m runner.

Grizzly bears eat people without the benefit of music.

You entered a marathon with hills? You idiot.

In those long, lonely miles you put in during the off-season, and in those knife-in-the-gut repetitions and hill repeats that buckly your knees - at that moment in almost every race when you ask yourself how much you're willing to hurt to catch one more runner - you can draw strength and inspiration from your running mates.