Thoughts on the curiously elastic limits of performance

By Konstantinos Apostolou

I’m approaching the finish line when, just 30 seconds before crossing, I hear the race staff saying on the handheld radio: “The third is coming.” Only in the last 50 metres do I realise that I’m on the podium.

I’m crossing the finish line. My girlfriend is waiting for me there. She grabs me by the head, staring at me with wide eyes. “Wow, baby. I didn’t know you were that good.”

I smile, exhausted. “Neither do I.”

In the Foreword of Alex Hutchinson’s book Endure...