Watching tonight’s Friday Film, I appreciated how the main organizer of the marathons emphasized that they were as much a low-stakes opportunity to learn how to fail as a competition about pushing yourself to the limit to achieve success. The extremely high difficulty meant that there was no shame in choosing to drop out of the race. I really liked the observation the main organizer made that runners in the Barkley Marathons define for themselves what success is and can ignore anyone jeering at them for failing to complete the race. This is a skill that sometimes seem to be in short supply. Even more, I was struck by how so many people stayed after dropping out to wait for and support the remaining runners. After months of preparing for this race, they were able to let go of any frustration and focus their efforts on making sure others were taking care of themselves. It does seem, as the interviewed people said, that the races are a good character-building experience for the runners as well as a place to make friends.

I also really liked John’s story of coming back from a really low point in his life, though his circumstances were apparently more from bad luck than any failing on his own part. The moment where he got up from lying down in the water was truly admirable. The film director(s) did a good job organizing that part of the film especially.