MEKITA AZNAR
on sleep
“Sleep is super important, in fact, it’s the reason that I don’t do double days during training – I value that sleeping time. The week before a marathon, I’ll go to bed an hour earlier than I usually do so that I can bank some sleep because between feeling nervous and having to wake up early, the night before the race isn’t usually a great sleep.”
on hydration
“I made the mistake of overhydrating before a race once – the New York City Marathon and it was bad news – bloating and diarrhea. Now I know not to overdo it with the water the week leading into a race (which can actually hurt your outcome because you dilute your body’s electrolytes when you’re peeing all the time). I actually get really nervous when I see people carrying huge bottles of water around race expos, I just want to snatch it out of their hands and say – ‘don’t guzzle it!’”
on ‘the wall’
“I bonked during the Boston Marathon in 2014. I was on pace for a PB until 36k and then it was ‘lights out,’ so to speak. I had a breakfast that I wasn’t used to and didn’t eat enough of it and combined that with going out too hard. It was a learning experience.”
best story?
“I just ran the Calgary Marathon linked up with nine other runners, in support of MitoCanada, a charity for mitochondrial disease. We were going for a world record, which meant that we needed to have it filmed, so we had a cyclist join us along for the ride. At about 36k, one of us started to hit the wall and to distract us, our cyclist, Kari, started telling us her story – about how she had lost two children to mitochondrial disease and how sport had helped her persevere through the pain of each of their deaths. Our singlets for that race said, ‘Running for those who can’t,’ but it was Kari telling her story that put things into perspective – any hardship that you go through during a race is nothing, absolutely nothing compared to what people are battling through. She was so positive throughout the whole experience and it reminded me of the strength of the running community and the opportunities that we have to help one another.”