Teenage hobbies can vary from person to person. Some play tennis, some have a job, maybe some even like running. Junior George Carter spent his summer doing all of this, oh and he trained for his first marathon- almost forgot. 

When George’s cousin offered him a free marathon ticket, the offer seemed too good to turn away. Although this was a big commitment, the focus on fitness was not new for him.

“There was no huge dividing factor where I decided to start training, but I was already kind of doing more fitness, and dieting since last July. It is kind of like an extreme version of what I was doing,” he said. 

Although there wasn’t a whole lot of thought put into the start of training, balancing a marathon level of training, on top of an already busy schedule, definitely took some sacrifice.

“I like to play tennis, exercise, hang out with friends, but I also work a lot so it was kind of hard to run when I had a lot else going on,” said Carter.

Like any big commitment, training for a marathon over the course of one summer meant Carter had to train whenever he could. With work, tennis, and his social life, squeezing six training days a week definitely came at a cost.

“When I got home from work later I would usually run on the treadmill or run in the dark,” Carter said. 

His training wasn’t just going on a run every day, but rather a meticulously planned schedule to get him ready in time. Carter started training with one eight-mile run a week, but he bumped his longer run up two miles each week. Pairing that with three-mile recovery runs, and one rest day. 

All of this would be impressive on its own, but Carter admits that “I didn’t really have any motivation. I just thought it’d be an interesting opportunity, like something I can check off my bucket list that would be really cool to do.” Highlighting his ability to motivate himself.

His sister Caroline Carter, a freshman at TCU, described her brother  as, “the most dedicated and self-motivated human I have ever come across.” After seeing her brother train over the duration of his summer she said that, “He never complained about having to run 18 miles before school, he remained level-headed and determined until he reached the end goal.”

The months of work all led to the big day. Carter remembers the day as, “really cool.” He compared his experience training, “I was just by myself like listening to music compared to the marathon with running the actual marathon with like 40,000 other people and then there are also 50,000 other people cheering for you.”

Those watching cheered the runners on, no matter what, but thanks to Carter’s choice in tee-shirt he got an extra boost from some fellow horned frog fans. 

“They would cheer for me specifically because I was wearing a TCU shirt. It actually helped me a lot, and it kept me going when I was hurting,” said Carter.

Through it all, Carter is glad that he ran the marathon, and is glad the experience is something he can, “check off his bucket list.” When describing the day he only recalled good parts, never the downside to the experience. Though he expressed he is in no rush to do it all again, he learned a lot. Whether it was how to manage his schedule, how to run a marathon, or that a t-shirt can make a huge difference.