Talk About Guts

23

Phil Shin saw the ad for his first marathon in a California newspaper, and ran it four days later in the pouring rain. “It took me six hours and it was a God-awful experience,” he recalls, laughing. “In Los Angeles, it was the wettest marathon on record at the time, so I basically swam half of it.”

He swore that day he’d never do it again; he was wrong. The next 22 years of Shin’s life would include dozens of races — most recently, the Black Canyon 100K — and an everincreasing passion for the sport that helped save his life. Because in 2018, when Shin was diagnosed with a rare liver cancer, it was his marathon running that helped him withstand an intense series of surgeries and bounce back with unusual speed.

“Running definitely created this extended runway for my life while I was living with my diagnosis,” Shin explains. “Had I not been a runner, I don’t believe that I would’ve had the amazing outcome I did.”

But Shin says the real hero lives inside of him — literally. Mark Murphy, his college friend, took up running to get fit enough to donate a piece of his liver to Shin and, in the process, caught the crosscountry bug. Somehow, by giving a critical part of himself away, Murphy received a core piece of Shin in return.

Five months after the transplant, the pair conquered a half-marathon together. Murphy felt a full marathon was impossible, but Shin knew better. Last year both men crossed the finish line in Boston.

“I finished about an hour ahead of him and when he came through, I mean, we were both just a complete mess,” Shin remembers. “But this is kind of what it’s all about. It’s these miracle moments that show people that if two dopes like us can make this happen, then it can happen for anybody.”