a poem by Brent, aka FastTwitch
(adapted from the original by Rudyard Kipling)

If you can keep your head when all those around you are losing theirs and blaming it on you for forwarding them the entries,

If you can trust your legs when all men are doubting theirs, but make allowance for their doubting,

If you can wait at the freezing start line, and not be tempted to push and shove,

If you can enter master many races and not make races your master.

If you can climb a hill while all those around you are walking,

If you carry your few drops of water on your back and still have the nerve to quench the thirst of others in the pack,

If you can bare to do the training you’ve spoken, or watched a shoe or bone broken.

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew,long after they are gone
And so hold on where there is nothing in you,

If you can talk with the top 10 or walk with the bottom 10, if neither hills nor gravel nor mud can phase you

If all men run with you but none too fast,

If you can fill the unforgiving killometers with meters worth of distance run,

Yours is the forest and mountains
And which is more you’ll be a TRAIL RUNNER.