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# Tears for a Marathon
- URL: https://blog.makeprayerbeautiful.com/tears-for-a-marathon/
- Published: 2026-08-25T10:32:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-08-26T02:34:55.000Z
- Description: The great cloud of witnesses runs with us.
- Author: Amy Lykosh
- Tags: Testimonies

In April this year, Sabastian Sawe ran the London Marathon in less than two hours. Amazing.

But seven years ago, in 2019, Eliud Kipchoge first ran the distance of a marathon in under two hours. His 1 hour, 59 minute, 40 second marathon was not a race, but an exhibition time trial, a precision endeavor.

To break that two-hour mark for the first time required several key elements.

• Find the Michael Jordan of distance running. 

• Schedule a marathon for any of eight days that would have the most optimal running weather. 

• Plot the course on a specially optimized route, as flat as possible. 

• Send a cyclist along to offer as much hydration—in the favorite brand of the runner—as needed. 

• Find a cohort of Olympians and other distance superstars to rotate through, in a phalanx of seven, as a windbreak to improve aerodynamics. 

• Project a laser from a car in front to keep the optimal pace.

• Run four and a half minute miles. Mile after mile. (The world record for the mile at that time was 3 minutes, 43.13 seconds. To run four and a half minute miles, again and again … blisteringly fast.)

I read about how Kipchoge “dulls the pain of distance running by smiling mid-competition.” 

Trillia Newbell, in her book *Sacred Endurance*, wrote: “As research shows, part of an athlete’s training includes methods for dealing with pain. Some distract themselves by reciting poems or counting strokes. These athletes are actively engaging their minds to run the race set before them. Although to us their work looks effortless, they are working both physically and mentally to endure to the end” (54).

I suspect I’ve had years in my life where I frowned most of the time. 

Perhaps I would have carried less pain if I had smiled more.

But the most moving part of this story, the part that brought me to tears, was [the photo of Kipchoge’s finish](https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/10/kipchoges-sub-two-hour-marathon-how-legitimate-it/599974/?ref=blog.makeprayerbeautiful.com). Kipchoge in focus. And, blurred in the background, all of his pacesetters. Some with arms raised. Pink shoes still running, leaping, enormous grins. 

And the bicyclist, too, pumping his fist. 

A new picture of what it means to run the race with endurance. 

Not alone. But with a great cloud of witnesses, all celebrating. 

*Lord, Hebrews 12:1-2a says, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.”* 

*Lord, thank you for this great cloud of witnesses. Thank you that we get to throw aside all that hinders us. May we run our race well.*

*Jesus, thank you that you are the pioneer—or, as also translated, the founder, the author—and perfecter of faith. You’re the one who steps out in faith and who brings it to completion.* 

*May we be marked as people of faith. Thank you, Lord. Amen.*

Thanks be to God for the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, 

Amy Joy

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