Running the World Marathon Challenge Twice with Dallas White Rock Marathon Board Member Paul Box

DFW Running Talk: Paul Box
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CHris Detzel: [00:00:00] Welcome to DFW Running Talk. I'm Chris Detzel, so let's get started.

Welcome to another DFW Running Talk. I'm Chris Detzel and today's special guest is Paul Box. Paul, how are you

Paul Box: doing? Good, Chris. Thanks for having me on, man.

CHris Detzel: Hey man, I appreciate you coming on. You. We did a little pre-show and you mentioned you had a beer, so I'm a little jealous I didn't grab a beer.

But that's the best time is to have a talk with the beer,

Paul Box: I can say we're not doing this in the morning, so at least no one out there thinks I'm having like the morning beer. But yeah, it does. It's good evening. Beer work is over time to relax a little bit.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. The morning beer, it's always hard.

I rarely on some of these races, and they have a beer at eight o'clock in the morning or whatever, drinks. I'm like, man, I just, I have a hard time drinking a beer. After, at 8:00 AM no matter when,

Paul Box: sadly, probably don't. But I'm, I wanna make sure I try to have a hard time. I do enjoy a good beer after a race for sure.

CHris Detzel: Teach your own, Paul, that's right. I was talking to Marcus and [00:01:00] Jody, the guys that kind of run the Dallas Marathon, or at least race directors and things like that, and they mentioned your name. I did some slight research background on you and you have quite the amazing background and a couple of things that we'll get into.

We'll get into your story around how you started running, what that means, but you've done that kind of this seven continents in seven days around the world kind of thing. You even wrote a book about it. You did that back in 2 20, 23, but you also did it. Again recently, like a week ago. And so we'll get into that, which is extremely impressive.

And then you're also on the board of the Dallas White Rock Marathon. I think you've been doing that for some time. And you have a special, we'll have a special thing we'll talk about with the Dallas Marathon around elite racers I think is and you can give us background on that kind of stuff, Paul, before we start all of that.

And don't get me wrong, man, I'm super excited. I don't even know where to start almost, but let's start from the beginning and Yeah. Talk a little bit about your running journey and kinda where you started.

Paul Box: [00:02:00] No, absolutely. So yeah, I started running really as a kid, but nothing ever serious.

My parents truly at age three was my first Dallas Turkey truck and it was tradition. I think I missed two Dallas Turkey tris until I was like 35 years old. Wow. Family tradition. Loved it. It's awesome. And really the only reason we stopped is 'cause having kids. It took us longer to get to the starting line of the race.

It sure does because that's how packed it was that it did to actually run the race.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: Absolutely just love. In fact, I'll be doing the walks of Hatchet, Turkey trot on on Thursday. Long story short, we used to do Turkey trots. That was about it. I played tennis in high school and I played tennis at small school in college, and it didn't really start running until I was 30 years old.

I really, I woke up one day actually on Thanksgiving Day, decided that I felt like I was outta shape. I signed up for the Oklahoma City Marathon that day and wow. Those where if I sign up for something, then I'm gonna, I'm gonna [00:03:00] train for it. And I always believe there's two different types of marathoners.

There are the ones that finished their first one and they say, glad I did it. I never wanna do it again. And then there's the others that say, I'm glad I did it. When's the next one? And I was that person. So it steamrolled since I've done a lot of races since then.

CHris Detzel: Did you, so when you first did your first marathon, how'd you do?

You mentioned you trained, what did that look like? The whole training and things like that?

Paul Box: Yeah, so my I really found how Higdon's online training I don't even know which one, like intermediate two or something that I just felt like I could probably do, and I followed it to a t like I'm always was like the most coachable person.

So yeah, if it said run 90 seconds slower, I was probably. Within 89 to 91 seconds slower on my paces and I just followed it. I was aiming for a sub three 30 for no other reason than my cousin, my very best friend, his first marathon, he did a three 30 and I just knew I had to beat him.

CHris Detzel: Wow. That's pretty support first [00:04:00] marathon. It was a good

Paul Box: first one. I did a 3 29 and change and it was happy as could be. You're not competitive or anything, huh? Not at all. No, not at all. I it's always about winning, sadly.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. I tell people whatever motivates you to keep going and doing those kinds of things, it's in general, most of us, most people on here, no matter how fast they've been, they're probably not gonna be elite and they're not gonna get paid.

To do this for a living, so you gotta have some internal motivation, to go out and, hey, maybe I can pr or maybe I can beat my cousin or friend, or what, I love it, I like the competition,

Paul Box: Yeah. I'm never gonna be the fastest and I'm way okay with that.

I'm, I've never aimed for that. I aim for what I think is possible and I also enjoy racing like a couple of races a year, but I enjoy. Running a lot of races a year that are just for fun, not racing, not caring. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's fun to have both, but yeah, no one's gonna pay [00:05:00] me for this, miss.

I'll never be at speed and I'm much too old to consider it now.

CHris Detzel: My thinking is that, I've been running probably for, I dunno, 15 years or something like that, just very consistently. And you know how now it's like I'm 50 years old and I would just love to kinda continue to run at a high level, and if I get slower, which is gonna happen at some point very soon, it's fine.

I just wanna still be able to go out and stay in shape and run and just to hang out with my community and friends and things like that, and be able to have conversations like this,

Paul Box: it's where my friendships are. Like, I work, I have a wonderful family. How I get to hang out with my buddies, how I get to spend time with my closest friends is we go run together.

Yeah. And so it is my community and that's one of the reasons I passionately love it.

CHris Detzel: So you decided to run this first marathon at 3 29. Pretty amazing. You really. Did the training to the T and then you kept going. So what was, what kind of continue what would that look like?

Paul Box: Yeah, absolutely. So I had our first child about six months after that, and training definitely went downhill for a few years. [00:06:00] Worth it going downhill. But then I decided I wanted to try to qualify for the Boston Marathon and started aiming for that. In fact, I had just about given up running and my closest running buddy he qualified.

And more than anything else, Chris, it just pissed me off that he qualified and I didn't. And

CHris Detzel: yeah, I love it.

Paul Box: There it is. Found a race. And in, actually, in fact, I I flew up to New Jersey 'cause I found a flat, fast race on the New Jersey shore and Uhhuh. Qualified and then you, it was one of those things where, okay, let's qualify.

Okay, now let's break three, or now let's keep dropping that number a little bit. And that was fun. And I still enjoy aiming for certain objectives. I've done Boston. I think this year will be my, I'm not sure, 11th or 12th, straight year. Nice to be Boston. So I really enjoy it. It's a fun race.

But I've started adding in the longer stuff. Love Ultras. Probably the 50 mile distance is my favorite distance in the world. Yeah. 'cause you don't, you just cruise, right? You just, you hang out but you don't spend all night. Yeah. And [00:07:00] yeah I enjoy the ultras and the FKT world has become like my new passion and my new favorite thing to do.

I love the FKT world. And and that's, say that's kt. What's

CHris Detzel: it? I don't even know what that is.

Paul Box: So fastest known time. It's a great website. If you just Google FKT and okay, there's these courses across the entire world. So like a buddy of mine and I, we went to Panama this year. We put our feet in the in the Caribbean and we ran to the Pacific.

CHris Detzel: Yeah,

Paul Box: it's 53 miles and you can do it anytime you want. You show up and there's no race or anything. You just show up and go. And the FKT website has these courses everywhere in the world. I don't even know how many are on there, but you can just pick a course, go run it on your own, and you can aim for the fastest known time, or you just like me, you just go run it.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: Wow. And so this next year we're gonna go run Hadrian's Wall, which is like across Scotland.

CHris Detzel: Wow.

Paul Box: Because be chilly out

CHris Detzel: there and windy.

Paul Box: Yeah. Wow. So it's a [00:08:00] really cool website. Yeah. It's a way too, man. I'm all about the adventures, what can we do to go adventure when we run,

CHris Detzel: obviously.

I love that. Let's get more into that in a minute, because I'm a little bit intrigued now. So you start running the Boston Marathon. You're at, you're 11 in a row, which it's awesome. I get to see you this year. My wife is on her 13th in a row, I think. That's awesome. I just like to follow her and do podcasts now and quick hits and just hang out with people there, and I told her, I was like, you have to now qualify every year so that we can, so I can go

absolutely.

What's your fastest you've hit under three i, I assume and things like that, or

Paul Box: two 50 is my, I've done two 50 a couple of different times. Once at the Fort Worth marathon and once at Boston

CHris Detzel: Fort Worth. Like just the Fort Worth, like November, whenever,

Paul Box: yeah, the November one super flat, right on the Trinity River Trail and, yeah.

I don't even, what, maybe four years ago? Something like that. Okay.

CHris Detzel: Andy Wing is the. Director of that one now.

Paul Box: I know the name, but yeah,

CHris Detzel: it's Andy Wang. Yeah.

Paul Box: Yeah. It's a great [00:09:00] race. It's a great little, it's never been a huge race, but it's a great race.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: I've done a, they did a really good job with it.

CHris Detzel: 20 miler or something like that before, years ago. They used to have a 20 miler, so they had a marathon, a 20 miler, and. Half or I don't remember, I don't know what they have now but yeah, the director's pretty cool. Three 50, is that somewhat recent or?

Paul Box: I did two 50 in Boston in 2023, I think.

Okay. It might have been 24, 23 or 24. I did a 2 54. This year in Boston, I go back and forth. So one year I'll run it hard and then the next year I'll do a four 30 and have a beer at the top of Heartbreak Hill. Awesome. And I really love both Rus. That's, look, again, no one's paying me for this.

And even when I finished two at a two 50, I remember my daughter when I got home, she was like, so dad, what place did you get? And I was like, 1632nd place. And she was not all that impressed. Yeah I mean it's not like you go to Boston to, for me, I don't go to Boston. Anything [00:10:00] other than just, either have fun or see what I have for the day.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. Look, there's so many fast people there hitting so many great times. Literally the people in general, the people at Boston are the best of the best within their age groups, right? They just are. Yeah. That's a tough one to

Paul Box: still. Cool. Just running with some of those people and just, seeing them.

I, real quick story. I remember lining up my first year to do Boston and there was this lady next to us and she had to be, I don't know, 60 years old. And, they put you in order of your bib number in Boston and her bib number was lower than my bib and I don't remember what I qualified with. A 3 0 1, 3 0 2, something like that.

I just remember thinking. What in the world is this lady? And we got talking to her and I don't know how many she'd done, but she had gotten 10th place, us female, her first year to do Boston. And we got talking about it. She was so interesting. But when the race started, I never saw her again. She just took off.

And how awesome.

CHris Detzel: There's some, how awesome is that? Yeah. And it's not just the best of the best, most of these people are pretty serious about their [00:11:00] running. And and I love your kind of take on it. Sometimes you're really serious and sometimes, just doing it for fun. I love that. And I think that's a really cool way to be, and so you've done all these marathons. You're doing Boston again, so I hope to see you there for sure. Yeah. What just in 2023, you also did, I. The seven marathons. Seven continents. You like adventure.

Tell me about what led up to that and your thinking around that. I have a feeling I already know. It is just, let's sign up and do it.

Paul Box: In all reality, I was at a at a dinner for the Boston Marathon. I got invited some John Hancock dinner like in 2017 or something like that. They brought in med Lesi, they brought in bill Rogers and they had all these like elite, elite runners up front.

And then they brought in this random lady and and they were asking all about all these questions to all these runners. And then they asked this lady, they're like, so who are you and what have you done? And she said I just ran seven marathons. Seven continents in seven days. And I can remember when she said that, thinking to myself [00:12:00] that will do that.

That's just amazing. And it hit me so fast forward a few years, I'm sitting on my back porch during the middle of COVID thinking, wo is me. I can't run a race right now. And. So I went and found the website that it just came to my mind. I found the website I applied to run just as a, almost a joke to myself.

I thought, there's no way they'll put me in. And lo and behold, about two weeks later, I get an email back from the researcher saying, Hey, we'd love to have you. Here's the cost I hadn't even talked to my wife of about it yet. Yeah. 'cause I figured there's, they're not gonna let me in. And and so I, I got that email and I, my wife, is not one to have a glass of wine, but a port, a glass of wine, just hoping that maybe she relax a little.

And luckily my wife's the most gracious, wonderful person in the world. She's look, this is an adventure of a lifetime. Yeah. I had to wait a few years to do that one because of COVID. But yeah, ended up running it at the, end of January, 1st of February in 2023 with the World Marathon Challenge Group.

And it was unbelievable. It was special in a million ways. I'm [00:13:00] still, I still communicate with that group of runners probably on a daily basis.

CHris Detzel: Oh, with the group. So let's back up because I like how you just gave the high level, let's go a little deeper into this, because. I'm so interested.

I've heard people do it, but never really talked to anybody that's done this. What is it like, go walk me like through kind of day one, or. Like you meet on a plane, you go here and you go there. I did talk to, by the way, I did talk, I have spoken to the guy a guy, I forgot his name on the podcast last year or late, early this year I think, or late last year.

And he was the first African American to do seven continents, seven days, and seven marathons after. Really? That's what he told me. So That's awesome. I believe him. Yeah. Anyways, yeah. So yeah, tell me about that.

Paul Box: Yeah, with both groups. So this year I ran with a different group, but with both groups you have to arrive.

So we all meet in Cape Town, so they. They have a group, it's usually somewhere between 45 and 75 runners. And we meet in Cape [00:14:00] Town usually about three days before the planned start date. And the reason they have to meet early is 'cause they don't know exactly the weather window that's gonna let you into Antarctica.

Arct is weather is vicious. And yeah, it can, it can change really quickly. And so they're watching it and they'll have an Antarctic Antarctica logistics company come to speak to us. So you get there about three days early just. Just to be prepared. The 2023 year, they actually scooted our race up by nine hours and we took off.

We, it was crazy. We were planning to sleep all night and they said, don't go to sleep. Get to the air, get to the hotel. We're gonna shuttle to the airport, but. Anyhow you arrive, you meet in Cape Town, you have a few meetings with the whole group, and then you take on for Antarctica, they try to make that race, number one.

They try to make that race number one because Yeah. Everything is shaped around that. You run down there in Antarctica and it's, you can get a lucky year. Like last year they had a lucky year in 2023, we had an unlucky year, and in 2025 [00:15:00] we had an unlucky year. It was just brutal, unbelievable conditions.

But you run there and then you come back and you fly right back to Cape Town. It's only a five and a half hour flight between the two.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: And you're all on one plane. And it's a chartered plane and then you take a chartered plane from continent to continent. You sleep on the plane.

You eat on the plane. People were bringing their massage pants and putting those on the plane. That's cool. Ev everything, you live on the plane together. Shoot, you're even like wearing your bib as you go through customs in Abu Dhabi or something like that.

CHris Detzel: That's great.

Paul Box: And yeah, I answer, but it's, so you go down to Antarctica, you get off the plane run.

This year we ran 10 laps on an ice runway.

2.6 or 4.2 kilometer laps on this ice runway. And this, this year we had negative 35 Fahrenheit windshield. Oh

CHris Detzel: man. Geez.

Paul Box: It was in fact, my dad and my daughter were with me this year just for the first two races. They were in [00:16:00] Antarctica and Cape Town.

CHris Detzel: Wow. And

Paul Box: they actually had to pull my daughter off the course and I got frostbite on my face. It's finally cleared up, but wow. Yeah, it was, it, this year was pretty pretty unbelievable.

CHris Detzel: How long does that take you to do to the Antarctica one?

Paul Box: It's a hard one this year. So in 2023 I'm bouncing between the two

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

No, I think it's fine. I think this is fine. Yeah.

Paul Box: In 2023, it took me three hours and 53 minutes. This year it took me four hours and eight minutes.

CHris Detzel: Okay. It's not that bad.

Paul Box: Yeah. Look it's survival. Wouldn't. Man, I got third place both years in the Antarctica race. This tells you how hard it was this year.

The guy who got first in Antarctica this year, I think he ran a 3 52, but he's a 2 24 marathoner.

CHris Detzel: Dang.

Paul Box: You had a chance Actually. He's a professional. He runs for Red Bull. He runs for on, okay. Yeah, I had a chance. Of course, I'm thinking if I actually would've caught the guy, he would've just, sped up, but

CHris Detzel: maybe not. Maybe 3 52 maybe.

Paul Box: So yeah, it was brutal and [00:17:00] even sounds like it back. Yeah. Even 23, it was brutal. Like it's just, those conditions are harsh.

CHris Detzel: Does, is there like really a winner or get anything for that? I mean like a bib or a, a trophy or something?

I don't know. Do they, it's the same people that you're going against

Paul Box: this year. I actually ended up getting first place for the week. You did. I did, it was the number one guy, the professional guy, he dropped out in Abu Dhabi in race number four. He he had surgery this summer and just wasn't in quite the condition he needed to be in.

And that kind let the mirror marbles raise for it. I ended up having the, so they look at it as lowest average time for the week. Yeah.

CHris Detzel: And so

Paul Box: whoever has the lowest average time for the week. So two years ago I finished in third, and this year I was able to take home the congratulations, man.

CHris Detzel: I think it's, I think it's when you say mere mortal, mere mortals don't do seven marathons, seven days and seven continents, I think it's, a lot of. There's something different about somebody like you, you know what I mean? You get third and then you get first.

Something [00:18:00] like, how do you train for that? Is it just normal marathon training or what?

Paul Box: It's definitely adding in, back to back and multiple, back to back long days. The first go around at 23, I would try to do two long days in the middle of the week and like semi long days 'cause I have a job, I have family.

Yeah. Something like, 12 to 15 miles back to back on Tuesday, Wednesday, and. And then on Saturday, Sunday, I'd try to throw in like a, a two hour, three hour or two and a half hour and a three hour or a double marathon. Just something to really beef up those miles. I was running longer four days a week and then running really short, probably two days in resting this year.

This year was way different 'cause I was the assistant volunteer cross country coach at my kid's school. It's the best position ever. It's assistant, it's volunteer, so they can't require anything of you. But that thing really, but you knew being the kind

CHris Detzel: guy likes to go all in

Paul Box: yeah. Oh yeah.

Yeah. So I was there. I definitely put him the time, but it really did some crazy stuff to the training because. I love this cross country team. They're wonderful, but a lot of 'em are brand new runners. So [00:19:00] there's people that I'm running with and we're running like, yeah, 10 or 11 minute paces and then we might throw in a six minute mile.

I run with the first guy. And so this year the training was all wonky and messed up, but it just came together.

CHris Detzel: That's impressive, man. Out of those seven marathons, which one kind of stands out the most? Is it Antarctica? 'cause it was so coal and you got frostbite? Or is there another one that you know, might stand out?

Paul Box: Yeah, so I, it's funny because they are really, they really are also different. So Antarctica definitely. It stands out because it's truly that brutal. It was just unbelievably brutal. But then Perth, Australia is beautiful. The people are great. The setup is great. You run along this Swan River and it's gorgeous Abu Dhabi this time, it was Dubai last time, but that United Arab Emirate Emirates, that's just really cool.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: This time we ran in Columbia for South America. Last time we ran in Brazil. That one stands out because it's just horrible. It's so humid. It's just, 95% humidity and it's a. It's the second to last race, so [00:20:00] it's not even that exciting 'cause you're just waiting. And then Miami is the last race both times.

And Miami's special because usually of the, 50, 60, 70 runners, a lot of 'em have family and friends. And a lot easier. Yeah. And then this year they actually videoed a line feed via Twitch. For all the races, which is really funny. 'cause then when you're running Miami, all the family members of all these other runners knew you.

And oh,

CHris Detzel: that's funny.

Paul Box: Like you're running along and they're like, and that's great. That made it a lot of fun. Just 'cause then you get to interact with people and so Miami's very special because it's the last one and it's the, I mean it's really where it's just a big celebration.

CHris Detzel: That's pretty cool man.

Miami it, I'm sure it was warm

Paul Box: there. It was warm. It wasn't horrible. I'm trying to think. Miami, we ran Miami just this past Friday and it was quite 75 when I finished the race. Perth was 95 degrees the other day. So it's all relative at that point. Yeah. So when we ran [00:21:00] Antarctica and then we ran Perth.

It was like 120 degree difference between one day of running. It was crazy.

CHris Detzel: Wow. Yeah, it's gotta like mess up your body a little bit,

Paul Box: man it does some of it. I'm really convinced that your mind doesn't allow your body to get messed up too much. 'cause your mind's suck it up.

You're about to run another one.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: You just people were all, people were asked. What about jet lag? You don't flag because you're not on a continent long enough to like Yeah. Adjust to the time anyhow.

CHris Detzel: That's so interesting.

Paul Box: So yeah, it's, you really, it's tough. It's a tough race.

But for a week all you do is eat, sleep, and run.

CHris Detzel: How cool is that? I like

it then. I love

it.

Paul Box: It's it's run camp like it's an adult run camp. It's relationships and friendships that I'll keep forever. I, last year I flew to Luxembourg to run with a buddy that I ran the 2023 event with.

Why? Because he's a close friend now and we keep up.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. My wife and I do, I wouldn't say [00:22:00] that kinda stuff, but we've done there's this race. I think this year was the last year, or last year was last year. It's this one. But anyways, it's 120 miles in six days, 20,000 feet of gains in Colorado.

And you go from one place to another every single day. And you run, it could be a 25 miler one day, 13 miles the next day. It's all in general. There's a 13 miler that was straight up a mountain. You started out in Leadville, and so seven or eight miles, it's taken you literally an hour or so to walk or to walk up a mile.

You know what I mean? Yes. This gets not 25 miles that day, but we've done several things like that, and it's, to me, it's just fun. It's adventurous, it's not necessarily about the speed per se, can be to some degree, but, yeah. In that time it wasn't, 'cause we live in Dallas and this was Colorado.

We're like, let's just do the best we can. 'cause we're both pretty fast, but we're not. We knew we didn't have a

Paul Box: chance. So I love that. Part of the reason I do this is I want my daughters to adventure. Yeah, I got to take my daughter to Antarctica last [00:23:00] week. And how old is she?

And I want my, she's 15.

CHris Detzel: Oh, okay. Perfect.

Paul Box: Yeah. And the coolest thing about this, don't me wrong, I love the medal. Like you come across that Dallas finish line and you get handed in that medal, you've worked your butt off for that medal. And if it's your first one, like I love watching the elites, that's awesome.

But honestly, the best people coming across the finisher, the first timers because there's just this rare joy there. But the metals are cool, but on the other side of it. You get to a point where you're like, man, I just want to adventure. And yeah. Whether that's running across Panama or running seven marathons or running up a mountain, starting at Leadville, or, just what can your body do?

What people can you meet you get to meet people from all across the world doing these crazy things who are like-minded, like you, who just wanna. Push their bodies and enjoy the world a

CHris Detzel: hundred percent, man. I love it. Now do you run with a community at all or have you run like in one of these, running groups or anything or,

Paul Box: yeah.

So walks out. Your running club used to be still is a huge thing, but it got so big [00:24:00] that it got splinter groups.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. And

Paul Box: then Midlothian running club down the street. I have a lot of good buddies. For the most part, I've got about five buddies I run with here in Waxahatchee, and we probably run together on average, which are quite a week.

And then we will, some weeks it's three or four times. Some weeks it's once, but I've got about five buddies I run with here in town. And then, yeah, if I'm in Dallas I'll reach out to a friend or two and try to meet up and go run. But yeah, for the most part it's about five guys here in town that I run with a lot and they're my closest friends.

Cool.

CHris Detzel: Yeah, and that, I think that. I tell people all the time, community is key. At the end of the day, whenever you're thinking about like continuous running and yeah, because nobody wants to do it all the time by themselves. You have to do a lot of miles on your own. In general, especially like the kind of training you've been doing.

And if you're doing 30, 40, 50, whatever, miles more, you know you're gonna have to do a lot alone. There's, but there's nothing. Better than running with a community. You're 20 miler on Saturday or Sunday or whatever, or your fast speed stuff. 'cause speed stuff is hard, who wants to do that by themselves, [00:25:00] all the time.

Paul Box: Yeah, and I'm 45 years old, so it's not like I'm not out there trying to win anything. I'm really, I'm not, and I'm not fast enough. To keep up with these elites that we'll talk about. I'm not, and so for me it's all, it really is about the community.

It's about, spending time with people. I love people that love me. It's about, pushing my body adventuring. Yeah. I still want to try and go fast just 'cause I enjoy pushing my body at times. Now the community's everything.

CHris Detzel: You're pretty fast, man. It's, I think that I interview a lot of people that maybe it, it's true like 14.

10, whatever years ago, I don't remember so many people running on a three hour marathons. I just don't remember that many people doing it. And I'm not saying they, they never did it, but it was like, oh wow. That's, and now it feels and maybe it's just the community I hang out with or talk to and things like that, I feel like everybody's hitting on a three hours.

Paul Box: Like you look at the qualification times for Boston and things like that. It's just wacky how. How fast it's getting crazy and running's popular, right? Running's so popular right [00:26:00] now and this one runner loves ano another runner and doesn't care how fast they are.

Yeah. I, one of my close friends just did their first second marathon. They ran New York City. Their goal was a 13 minute mile and I was just talked to follow them the whole entire way because you and I both know it does, it hurt less to go faster and it doesn't hurt less to go. Slower. It just hurts.

And you're pushing yourself and it's so cool.

CHris Detzel: Look, I remember pacing a marathon once and it was, the pace was four 30, whatever, four 30 was, I don't remember.

Yeah.

For me it was being out on my feet for out four hours and 30 minutes was hard, and and it would get hot and all this other stuff.

And it's hard no matter what, and those guys, that's their pace, and so for them it's really hard and it's doubly hard because, they're a actually out there for the, that time. I think, like it was hard for me, 26 miles. 26

Paul Box: miles. Yeah. Look, it doesn't get shorter.

It's, yeah I think I've done 75. Marathons [00:27:00] are longer now.

CHris Detzel: Wow.

Paul Box: And I always tell people, I say, look, the beauty of doing that many is, it's gonna hurt. The downside is you never know at which mile it's gonna hurt. It could start hurting a mile eight. That's gonna be a bad day.

CHris Detzel: That's right.

Paul Box: Yeah. Yeah. And it could start at 22 and you're like, I got this. Yeah.

CHris Detzel: That's right. I remember my PR not so long ago on a downhill half marathon and mile five. I felt it, my legs and I was like, this is gonna be rough. In, in that case it was more of mind over matter. I've been doing the miles, I've been training.

I knew that, from there on it was gonna be hard, but I still had to push, down the mountain, down the. And it was so much fun, dude. Yeah. And to me it's yeah, you don't know. Like I thought, mile 10 is gonna really hurt. No. Mile five is starting hurting.

Paul Box: And it's one of those where you're like, I could stop. And there's nothing wrong people, hey, sure. I would always argue if you haven't walked in a marathon, you probably just haven't done enough of them yet. Sure. I, if you hadn't been broken yet, then, but I, sometimes you're able to push through it and sometimes you're not able to push through [00:28:00] it and, cool.

That's right. Go do another one.

CHris Detzel: So you mentioned that you've done some 50 milers and other ultras. Talk a little bit about that and how you got into that. It must be the adventure thing that, hey, look, seven marathons, seven days, and seven continents, not enough. What else can I do?

Paul Box: So in reality, one, one of my really close friend buddies, one of the five guys I run with here, the one that, that I've run with the very most names, Matt Curtis, Matt.

I were running one day just around town. We had a 20 miler and I just said, man, we ought to go do like a 50 mile. We'd both been running, seven or eight marathons at this point. I said, let's do a 50 mile. And so we put on our own Waxahatchee, Paul and Matt 50 Mile. Thing.

Sweet. I even went to the local trophy shop. It had two tiny little medals made. They were like, I love

CHris Detzel: it.

Paul Box: Like the size of two quarters put together just for fun. And so we invited some other friends out and just said, Hey, if y'all wanna run the whole thing with us, run part of it with us, whatever, but we're gonna run 50 miles.

And it was in June of 2015, we did this. Okay. And [00:29:00] so we ran

CHris Detzel: it. So you've been doing this for a while.

Paul Box: Been do, been doing it for a little while and we finished it. And both of us just loved it. And in fact, we even started our own Ultra after that. That's, this year will be the 10th year.

So we do a race called the Hatchie 50. Okay. And we get about 500 runners and we put on a 50 mile we put on a ruck fisher's ruck. Oh, you did, man. And then a marathon and a relay. It's fun. Yeah. It's our fun. And yeah, not a big race. It's little thing down here. But, so I did that.

I'm done. 500 people, five,

CHris Detzel: nothing. That's awesome. Yeah. It's greats, it's

Paul Box: great. We have a great race and we, and it's a good show and it's a lot of fun. And the coolest thing is we get a lot of first time marathoners. Like a lot of first time 50 milers. Like I said, that's, they're my favorite people.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: Because they, they're one, they have no idea what they're getting into. And

CHris Detzel: That's right.

Paul Box: Yeah, it's a, but they just see the, you see how much they've worked for it. You see how hard it's hell that's really a lot of fun. But [00:30:00] yeah, so we, I started doing fifties and then signing up for the trail races and I ended up doing brass being a hundred mile maybe 2018.

And then I've done 24 hour races and stuff like that. And just, I just, in fact, my daughter, my 15-year-old and I did a, a 24 hour one in Fort Worth this summer. Wow. And she, her plan was just like to run a few miles every hour and then rest overnight. Yeah. This 15-year-old, she's awesome. She put in a 50 k.

Oh wow. It was a 24 hour race, but she was like, Dan, I felt good, so I'm just gonna go out for another lap. And so there you go. Is really cool to love with her. That's

CHris Detzel: amazing, dude. I love that. You've influenced her to, enjoy running and going out and do that. That's pretty cool. I've got a 15-year-old son and he kinda likes running, he is more into band.

He just started, yeah. He's a freshman and goes to Roy City and yeah, the guy's obsessed with band percussions specifically and he's amazing. Like it's really cool to see, but it's cool to watch your kids grow and [00:31:00] see them do cool things.

Paul Box: She called me today, she said, dad, I heard about this racing Bandera, and they have a 20 5K in January.

Now she does not like cross country. She did cross country this year, but she doesn't like waking up early. She doesn't like running really hard for a short period of time.

CHris Detzel: It's hard.

Paul Box: She loves the idea of going for a long casual run, and so I said won't come. She's out town right now with her friend and I said, come home, we'll talk about it.

She'll be home tomorrow and Yeah. There's Ion Running's been around for a long time.

CHris Detzel: Yeah,

Paul Box: man, it's an awesome race. I love Bandera. It's such a cool trail.

CHris Detzel: Do you know Rob Goen? Yes. Yeah. He had Hey hosts, drills. He used to, yeah. Yes. Trot. So Texas. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. He was the race director when I did

Paul Box: bras.

CHris Detzel: Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's right. He's not anymore man. He was a

Paul Box: great race director

CHris Detzel: and now he's back. So he started a new company. Yeah. Right now it's in Houston and things like that. So we'll see if he ever decides to expand back, DFW and stuff like that. But like Chris and Ann, [00:32:00] do you know they're from BLA trails and so they're the ones Yeah.

That do a lot of the local stuff. And then, so does, what's her name? Abby? Is that her name? Yeah. Yep. So I forgot. I know what you're talking about. But anyways, so there's a lot of good trails out. There's so many out

Paul Box: here. Trail around. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah,

CHris Detzel: absolutely. That's awesome man. Have you ever done a hundred mile or anything yet?

Paul Box: I did the bras bin a hundred miler and then that's it. A hundred miler and my 24 hour in July in Texas, I got 91 miles and it's still, wow. My, both of my daughters still gimme a hard time. 'cause I told 'em I was gonna do a hundred and they're like, dad, you didn't do it. That's true. That's right.

Yeah. Thank keep, they keep giving me hard time on that. So No just the 100 miler. I don't, and it kicked my butt. I, yeah, it worked out well and and I enjoyed the experience, but I think I like the a hundred K and the 50 milers more. You actually get to sleep the night after the race instead of keep running.

CHris Detzel: It's hard to stay up all night. My, my wife's done she's done. She attempted 100 miler Rocky Raccoon, and I think she got [00:33:00] 75 miles or something, and she was like, I'm done. But then she did the Arkansas Traveler a hundred miler, and she finished that one. And I don't think she's interested in doing these again.

Again, I do running, but I'm not like her, or you need to get

Paul Box: hard. Do the World Marathon or the Great World Race the Great World race and just have her go to all the continents. It's she'll love. She doesn't like that.

CHris Detzel: She might,

Paul Box: she'll leave, but now she's

CHris Detzel: into to weightlifting and stuff.

We turned 50. Yeah. Or she turned 50 a year ago or two, and then, now she's this big time into weightlifting. She does marathon still, but not as much. So she's pivoted a little bit. So we'll see. Hopefully she keeps going, just for the Boston thing. So

Yeah, absolutely.

You. Then something happened. How long have you been with part of the Dallas Marathon White Rock Marathon?

Paul Box: So I have been on the board, this is, I guess my, just my second full year on the board. I believe That's right. I was on the auxiliary board for a year. Like they call that, I don't know the suggestion board.

And they have a better name than that. And Marcus is gonna listen to this and, but I don't think he, I [00:34:00] think he's

CHris Detzel: too old to listen to podcasts, but I don't know.

Paul Box: But they had the like the advisory board, that's what it's called. So they had me on the advisory board and that was really cool 'cause you just get to be a part of it and and to speak into items.

And then they asked, is that kinda like

CHris Detzel: a try before you buy, then we'll, maybe we'll ask. Yeah. I take it the

Paul Box: try before you buy Hunter and the fact that they bought in this situation is a little surprising, but I'll take it. And yeah, so now I've been on the the regular board. I guess this is my second full year.

CHris Detzel: What does that, what do you do on the board? I don't even know what somebody on the board does.

Paul Box: Yeah. Really. We have meetings depending, I won't say, quarterly or monthly. It just depends upon when they're needed. As we come up to the race or we're meeting a little more often right now.

Sure. I think we do a couple of things. We can serve as someone, like in my situation where I help head up the Elite program actually. Do take something off of their plate. Like I, I'm able to take that off of Marcus and Jason and Jody's plate and Hailey and Patty and just take that from them.

I think other roles on the board is, that we've got, Ken on the board that handles [00:35:00] getting volunteers and he's phenomenal at it and. That's a lot of work. We have others on the board that are really good at just knowing people in the community and they're able to help connect people with sponsorships or when they have an attorney that can help read legal documents and and just they really, and our job is to serve as just some, an extra, extra set of minds on the board that can, be a, an oversight.

Team for the employees and just to make sure that the race is protected and make sure that Marcus and Jason and the team have thought through everything in the right way and we're able to, have ideas bounced off of us and then really hopefully we're serving them. Yeah. My job, the way I look at it is to serve the staff because they know what they're doing.

They know how to put on a race better than I do, if they say, Hey Paul, can you do this? I just need to find the best way to do that.

CHris Detzel: I love that. And I think that's, it sounds like there's lots of really expertise in certain areas that's needed for a race. The marathon, the Dallas Marathon.

So that's pretty cool.

Paul Box: If you get a [00:36:00] board full of runners, you'll have a cool runner experience, but you'll mess some other stuff up. And if you get a board full of people that don't know running. The runner experience is gonna be horrible, but you may have a ton of sponsors and there's gotta be a great balance between the two.

I think most on the Dallas board have been on our waters, but they're also ones that have a lot of world experience in other areas. So that's a really cool balance between between,

CHris Detzel: I like that. That's pretty cool. So now you mentioned that you're leading up the elite group. What, tell me all about that.

Because, the first time I heard about it was. When I was talking to Marcus and Jody and I was like, I didn't know that you guys were doing this. Yeah.

Paul Box: Yeah it's one of those where a few years ago I got a call from Charles Peyton, and Charles was the president of the Dallas Marathon Board before Logan.

Okay. And Charles is a good buddy of mine. He just said, Hey, would you wanna run in the elite group at the Dallas Marathon? I'm like, yeah, I wanna run in the elite group of the Dallas Marathon. That'd be incredible. And, hey, you've heard my time. I'm nowhere even [00:37:00] remotely close to being able to run with the guys like, Brent Woodle and some of these other guys.

Sure. But it was really fun to line up with them and I had a mile in. I didn't even see the front runner. They're just gone. Exactly. But it was really cool to line up with them, awesome. So that's when I first learned about it. And then then when I got on the advisory board, Logan asked if I'd help him on the morning of the of the Dallas Marathon, be over there. And then after Logan stepped in the president role, they asked if I would take on the elite role for Logan. Yeah, really our goal is to bring out some of the fastest and the best runners in the DFW area and, yep. And not just the DFW area, but from around the country and even if possible, around the globe to come in and run.

What is one of the fastest growing marathons in the world? And we don't pay for our elite runners, for our winners.

CHris Detzel: Yep.

Paul Box: But I would say Dallas marathons become a big enough name that it's gotten a lot of accolades. And so we get some really, just phenomenal speed to show up.

And it's fun to put, it's fun to put together.

CHris Detzel: Who's showing up this year? What does that look like? [00:38:00] Because isn't there some kind of special thing going on or,

Paul Box: yeah, you get a lot of the same local names that we've had in the past that are not just fast, like they're crazy fast. People like Mimi Smith.

Mimi is, not just elite. She's above elite. And then we've got a couple of guys like that are coming back that we've missed, like Joseph Hill, who's one. A couple of times in the past, of course we have

CHris Detzel: Oh, he is coming back.

Paul Box: Coming. Yeah, he's coming back and racing again. And to me that's really exciting.

We have one guy that I have not met face to face, but from what I understand, he is supposed to be one of our top 1, 2, 3 guys coming in. And I'm gonna say the name and then I'm gonna get an email because I say the names wrong. So y'all just forgive me now. But it's, his name is Craig. Let's see.

I know that his dad was a big time, but Craig Ton Leger lives down in New Zealand, but his family's from here. Wow. And evidently he's exceptionally fast. His family is a big running family. I think his dad wrote movie like the Dallas Morning Nose wrote a [00:39:00] lot of like running and so Nice. And that's on the men's side, on the women's side.

We've got a very small elite field for our women's marathon. That's probably my biggest disappointment right now. We've just had a number of 'em have to drop out because of injuries. But we still have some good, fast women coming in. But our women's half, people like Jillian Wolf and Kevin Hall, and we've got some really quick speed coming in

CHris Detzel: yeah, I know.

Jill, who, the second one you said?

Paul Box: Kaylin Hall.

CHris Detzel: Okay.

Paul Box: Cool. I don't know if yeah, but

CHris Detzel: I don't think I know her. I've seen, I think I've seen her on Instagram or something like that, but I don't know. She lives

Paul Box: west. I'm gotta think for a minute. Abilene Midland or some, she lives out somewhere, but she's been with us before.

She's run with us. A number of times. And and she's married to a guy named Carlos who's real quick as well. He'll run our elite program. And yeah,

CHris Detzel: A lot of the fast runners that are becoming faster and faster in Dallas anyways, the swats, they're not gonna be running. Most of 'em are running like what is it?

How come? I can't think of, it's the one [00:40:00] in Sacramento. But anyways,

Paul Box: CIM yeah. California. Yep.

CHris Detzel: Yeah, international. That's right.

Paul Box: One thing I know is we're always gonna have a race to compete with, right?

CHris Detzel: Yeah. Always.

Paul Box: And I kinda look at it and I really think Dallas does a good job of saying, we're not CIM, we're not trying to be CIM, but we are the Dallas Marathon.

And what does that mean? It means we're gonna put on a race that is runner friendly, that is going to be an ultimate runner experience. And I love that. I love the fact, Chris that it's not just like this super fast downhill course. It's also not a super slow course at all, but it's a technical course and I love a technical course.

Like you, the best runners are the ones that are gonna have done their homework beforehand.

CHris Detzel: Paul, there's almost 30,000 people that run this, just a marathon. Yeah.

Paul Box: So doing something right. It's a work out, and it's such a cool vibe out there. It's such a cool vibe and they keep doing, I'll tell you like bigger things.

CHris Detzel: I told Marcus this, and probably not as bluntly, but I [00:41:00] remember at first, I don't know, 10, 12, 13 years, 14 years ago, whatever. I ran it the first time and it was okay. It was not, but it wasn't like, oh man, this is amazing. But I would say in the last five to seven years, I don't, something's changed and it's a pretty great course.

The course I know changes a little bit, but it's a great atmosphere, great vibe, great people, and more and more people continue to come to it. And now the last two years it sells out like crazy. And this year it sold out crazier than ever because you guys are doing something right.

Obviously,

Paul Box: So I'll give a lot of props to this, to the team they've put together. There's a team of five that now work for the Dallas Marathon and they're not just good. They're extremely. Intelligent when it comes to obviously, and putting on a race. People like Jody Jordan, who knows the operations of as good or better than anyone.

Mark is who, how do you wanna put Mark as, he's like the Yeah, just the, he's the brains behind the operation of race day of [00:42:00] what that looks like and how we're gonna run things. Jason is just the ideal president to run on the organization. He looked at it from a race perspective, but he also understands the community perspective.

And Yeah. And he'll bring up things that I don't think the rest of us even imagined bringing up. And then Hailey and Patty bring in a social atmosphere. It's an incredible team.

CHris Detzel: I love it. And only five people run it, in a sense like are paid to do it, yeah. It's pretty amazing, and the cause is good, look, I'm running a half marathon again, and my wife and I are gonna be, come on. We're gonna be on that first day on like Friday. She's gonna be at the Giving away the bibs and I'll be giving away shirts and stuff like that. So it should be fun,

Paul Box: I'll be up there and I don't, I can't say a name until Jason or Marcus, someone says it.

But we do have an elite, elite female running the half this year. That could be pretty darn exciting as well. I think we'll compete with some of our top of elites and really push them i'd say get it. Get exciting. It's gonna be don't even talk about it. [00:43:00] We got the NAIA runners this year. Yeah. That's what I'm saying.

God, we're gonna have a hundred extra or 120 extra elites that are gonna push. It's and Chris, they're college. Some of 'em are gonna take off like, oh no dude, some of these guys are gonna take off so fast and just fall apart. Some of 'em are gonna take off and hold it together. And I love college runners because you just quite never quite know what you're gonna get.

But man, what a cool experience to have them up front with us.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. That's pretty amazing. So you guys are gonna have a special start for them, right? And then you start the next Is the first time we're start, you guys have done this. Go ahead.

Paul Box: We're gonna start the elite. Wait, so all of our regular leads plus the NAIA right at two minutes before Corral A, we did this, I don't know how many years they did it but I know they did it like five years ago or so.

Okay. They would do it this way and then they. Stopped. We do give 'em their own corral, so like we walk 'em to the front and things like that. But this year, yeah, this year, let's try 'em. It's such a big group. You're talking somewhere around [00:44:00] 175 total elites. We need to start them About two minutes.

Separative of corral. A just. More or less from from a safety standpoint.

CHris Detzel: And is this both marathon and half that they're running or is it specific to a,

Paul Box: the leads will be both marathon and half. NAI is all marathon, okay. When we think about the total elite group, it's gonna be practically 130, 140 marathoners and like 30 half marathoners.

So

CHris Detzel: how fill and five or six. Do you think that the rec, I don't know what the record is for Dallas Marathon, is that a possibility of being beat this year, you think?

Paul Box: I do think it's a possibility. We've got some speed coming in this year. So much, Hey, is it a 75 degree day?

Is it a yeah, rainy and 20 degree day? We have a good weather day looking at some of the times that n AI has put up, looking at some of the times of our. Of our elite marathoners. You're talking about the guys who are running 1 0 3, 1 0 4 halves.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: And that's quick, man.

That's [00:45:00] quick enough that I'd be surprised if we don't break it on a good weather day.

CHris Detzel: 'Cause all these folks who are marathoners, right? From the n ai, is that what you said? Yeah. So

Paul Box: NA. Yep.

CHris Detzel: Yeah, so that'll be interesting. Do you know, do you remember the course record? You don't have to know

Paul Box: that.

No, I, now I'm gonna have to go look though. No, I can make it up. No, I'm not even gonna try. No I don't know what it is, but I Now I'm gonna look it up because I wanna make sure we break that this year. It's gonna be exciting.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. That's fun. Yeah.

Paul Box: Go ahead. I'm just thinking like we're gonna have an elite meeting the day before.

I need to make sure I throw that out there to them. I would, and just so you know this is what it is. These

CHris Detzel: guys are competitive. They wanna beat there. Yes. You know what I mean? Put that in there.

Paul Box: I think the last couple of years, last year we had a, I had a guy who Travis D one was this.

Yeah. It was his first marathon for crying while, and he was young guy. In fact, he was signing back up again this year. Dealing with some injuries and things like that.

CHris Detzel: Yeah,

Paul Box: I

CHris Detzel: talked to him. I think one of the first guys I [00:46:00] talked to on the podcast is that, that right.

Okay. Now I'm gonna to go back and listen

Paul Box: to the original one. Okay? Yeah. Go

CHris Detzel: listen to it. Yeah, it was really good. Neat guy. Nice guy. The guy is just super kind and just I don't know why I was doing it, but he's calling me sir and stuff, and I was like, Hey man, we don't, I'm. I know I'm older, but let's not,

Paul Box: I forget how young he was, but I know he was like in medical school, I think UT Southwestern or something like that.

Yeah, that's right. And I remember the president of Scottish Wright coming over and talking to him like after the race Hey, when you finish medical school, make sure you give us a call or so like that. I thought, that's pretty cool for. For Travis to to at least even have that relationship or to be able to meet that person.

President point of Scottish rights. That is, yeah, Travis and the guy and what a race. Just an incredible race last year.

CHris Detzel: Yeah. It was incredible. And he just I guess not to get too deep into it, he's been running in college and things like that. So he is already running 70 miles a week and he goes why not just train for a marathon?

And he just absolutely killed it. His first marathon hitting 2 26 and I thought the sky's the limit for him, and still is. But yeah, he [00:47:00] got a little injured, and he's in medical school, so you know, he is got a lot going on.

Paul Box: I'd love to be able to run his bad times any day of the week.

CHris Detzel: Exactly. Darn. I ran at 2 32, it's terrible.

Paul Box: Exactly. Would be really upset about it.

CHris Detzel: Forward to it, that's a all other level. I look forward to seeing what the guys and gals do this year. It'd be fun to watch and I'll make sure to interview some of those folks after.

Paul Box: And I think our hope is to put on such a great show for the NAIA that. They don't even question coming back. We really think this could be a cool partnership. And we also actually restarted up the I think it's the, I might say it wrong again, but Sendai Japan Uhhuh partnership. I've heard about that.

So we've got two Japanese runners coming in, one run in the marathon and one run in the half. Two men. I'm really excited to see and I don't know anything about 'em. I don't have their times.

CHris Detzel: Yeah.

Paul Box: They're in the elite group, and I'm just gonna guess your country doesn't send you all this way if you don't know what [00:48:00] you're doing.

So I'm excited to see what those guys can do and also just excited to put on a coal experience for them. What can we do to show them the love and the care of DFW.

CHris Detzel: Now do they come in and get their bibs like. Friday or Saturday? Or do you just kinda do something special for them and say, Hey, here's the stuff, don't worry about it.

What's the treatment like?

Paul Box: Yeah last year we'd have 'em go up to the the time timer himself, get their bibs from, make sure we have it all set up. We have a little, we have a little goodie packages for our leads, things like that. We really want 'em to feel loved and cared for. This year, changing it up a little bit, we're actually having a meeting.

At the convention center the day before the race with there being a, closer to 150 this year. Yeah, there's more logistics. Everything from, the warmup area before the race. We're having to extend it and make it bigger. Try to get 'em porta-potties before the race. All the things that, that you just need to make sure are available.

Also, make sure that your elite runners really do feel like that. They're appreciated. We'll have a meeting before the race and [00:49:00] we'll hand out bibs at that time and do some introductions at that time.

CHris Detzel: Paul, did I miss anything? Is there something that, you're like, Chris, you should have asked this thing, and you didn't, you know that I should have?

Oh, man.

Paul Box: I get talked. I don't know, I just keep going and keep going, but no, man, this has been great. This is fun. I could talk running all day. I feel like you could too, i'm really excited. We're just a few weeks away from this.

CHris Detzel: We're just a few weeks away from the TAs marathon. I think it's amazing, man.

I think what you're doing and what you've accomplished just in your just running kind of journey is pretty awesome and pretty fun. And. Exciting. Like you keep it going and keep it exciting. The stuff that you're doing for not just Dallas Marathon, which is really cool, but this this race that you do in Waxahatchee, you know the 50 miler.

Yeah. And then 500 people are showing up for the last 10 years. That's crazy. That's awesome. Plus these seven marathon. Yeah, we have a good song. Seven days, seven continents, plus whatever the hell you've done, man. It's like amazing.

Paul Box: Running is my way to adventure, and if I could encourage anyone, it would be, Hey, [00:50:00] go out and find your adventure, whether that's, one mile through your neighborhood or a hike up a mountain or a running a trail.

But go out and find your adventure. This it's too beautiful of a world and too many great people out there to not go out there and meet a few of them. So I can't wait to meet, hopefully about 30,000 of my closest friends here in a few weeks of the Dallas Marathon.

CHris Detzel: Exactly. Paul, yeah, thanks for coming on to DFW Running Talk.

I had a ton of fun. So everyone, thanks for tuning in and listening. So make sure you go to DFW running talk.substack.com and subscribe to our newsletter. You'll get all the goodies there. And then, Paul, thanks for coming on. I really appreciate it.

Paul Box: Thanks Chris. Appreciate you having me.