Ben Lucas: ‘I’ve run more than 40 marathons and here’s what I’ve learned about resilience
On the eve of turning 40 in 2019, former NRL player Ben Lucas ran his 40th marathon. Here’s what inspired him to start running, and what it’s taught him about resilience.
These days Ben Lucas is a personal trainer and founder of super-successful boutique yoga and fitness studio Flow Athletic in Sydney, but he used to play rugby league for the Cronulla Sharks.
“I retired in my early 20s and went on to open a couple of personal training studios under a franchise,” Ben says.
“The studios went really well but once I had them up and running, doing the same thing day in, day out and having no real goal to work towards was harming my mental health.”
Marathon running to the rescue
Enter marathon running – signing up for his first race gave Ben the goal he was searching for.
“Footy players are rarely marathon runners, so I had to work quite hard at it,” Ben says.
“If I wasn’t working, I was running or rolling out with a foam roller.”
Ben ended up running 35 marathons in the space of five years and is now on track to run marathon number 45, just in time to celebrate his 44th birthday later this year.
Along the way, he’s learned a thing or two about resilience, which is the ability to cope with life’s unexpected changes and challenges, and how to keep nurturing it.
Ben’s top tips on building resilience
1. Realise you won’t always win.
“This is a big one that I struggled with quite a lot in my footy days, as you never want to have a bad game,” Ben says.
“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve made peace with the fact that I’m not always going to win and I’m not always going to perform at my best.”
2. Don’t be afraid to shift your goals.
“These days, I tune into how I’m feeling and I run accordingly,” Ben says.
“If I think it’s a good day for a PB (personal best), I’ll try for a PB; if I fail, I reflect on the run and what I can do to improve.
“On the flip side, sometimes I’m just exhausted; I will still show up, but I’ll run in a way that makes me feel better mentally as opposed to trying to achieve a PB – that way, I still get something out of my run and it means I’m less disappointed.”
3. It pays to have a plan.
“In terms of staying motivated when I’ve had a setback, I have my daily run scheduled into my diary and I keep it like I would any other appointment – no excuses,” he says.
Ben adds he also tees up a bunch of running events in advance, so he has multiple runs to work towards.
“That way, if I don’t do as well at one event, I can do better at the next one,” he explains.
4. Keep going when times get tough.
“During the pandemic, when I was forced to close Flow Athletic or when we had to work at a reduced capacity, I can’t tell you how stressful that was – it was a really hard time,” he says.
Ben set himself a challenge to run 5km a day, every day, to reduce the heightened anxiety he was feeling at the time.
“I did this every day for 365 days and I’ve mostly stuck to it since,” he says.
“It’s a great outlet, and the ‘runner’s high’ is real.”
5. Find things to be grateful for.
“There’s so much more to signing up for a marathon than just running and doing well,” Ben says.
“I’m grateful I can go out for a run, that I can sign up to all of these incredible events that take me all around the world, and that I can do this all with my community.
“If you appreciate the little things around it, you should still appreciate the journey – even if you don’t achieve what you’d hoped to achieve.”
Read more on resilience and mental health:
- Is sisu the key to greater resilience?
- Talk therapy alternatives that can help mental health
- 5 surprising and easy ways to boost mental health
Written by Karen Fittall.
