How would an ultra-marathoner answer the voice telling him to rest?

Scott Jurek is one of the most dominant ultramarathon runners in the world, he has won many of the sport's most prestigious races multiple times each. In his book, “Eat and Run”, Scott talks about his beginnings as a marathoner. He also had a voice telling him to rest, but let’s see how he confronted it.

I had my path. It had started in the flatlands, but now it was about to crest mountains. I needed the mountains. I drove out to the trailhead.

I ran Mount Si piece by piece. That first day, I made three trips up and three trips down as fast as I could. Then I drove home and put in a full shift at work.

But the next morning I didn’t want to get out of bed. I could hear music. It was the siren song of a warm bed, a cozy couch, a few hours of reading, or listening to music, or just being. No one was forcing me to run. No one said I had to. No one was going to die if I just relaxed a little. Those were the lyrics of the song. It was the catchy, terrible tune that had seduced so many runners to drop out of races. It was a melody I could not afford to listen to. The song was calling: Rest. You just ran one mountain. No need to do another.

The day after Mount Si, when all I wanted to do was stay prone, I blocked out the perilous tune. I tackled another course just as tough — some would say tougher.

During my two months training in Seattle, my endurance improved all by itself. My joints and muscles were memorizing new movements. My mind was becoming easier to empty and easier to fill with determination.

In the pre-dawn darkness before my final trip through the swamps of the Issaquah Alps, I heard something. I had made my three trips up Mount Si the day before. It was a familiar sound, but it took a few seconds before I recognized it. I almost laughed. It was the siren song that had beckoned with such urgency two months earlier. Rest, come back to bed. That morning, though, it was just a faint little ditty. It was background noise.