RUNNING TOWARDS HERSELF 

Published: 05/08/2026 | By: Alex Courbat

For Lucy Georgia, running has always been a reflection of what she's capable of. Not just because she's run Berlin, New York, London and Tokyo, or completed a half Ironman, but because it changed the way she saw herself. Before the medals and marathon PBs, she was someone who believed sport simply wasn't for her. This is the story of how she proved herself wrong. This is the story of why she runs.  

Before lockdown, Lucy Georgia wasn't an athlete in waiting. She wasn't the child who excelled at PE or the teenager who spent weekends at athletics meets. "I was the very unsporty kid at school," she says. "I wasn't in any teams. I didn't do any sports at school." Running wasn't something she'd fallen out of love with; it had never been part of her identity in the first place.

Like so many people, it took the strange stillness of lockdown to force a change. Home workouts began not because she had ambitions of becoming fitter but because she needed an outlet. "I started exercising mainly because I just needed something to do to feel good," she says. "Moving my body released all those emotions that were pent up." Exercise became about changing how she felt. It offered clarity on days that blurred into one another and gave her a sense of control when very little else did. 

Running entered the picture almost by chance. After lockdown, she stood on the sidelines of the London Marathon watching her boyfriend race through the streets of the capital. Amid the noise, the crowds and the collective emotion of marathon day, she found herself captivated. "I remember standing on the side of the marathon and I thought, 'This is so cool. I'd love to be able to do something like this one day.'" Then came the thought that would quietly alter the course of her life. "I had a real moment where I was like, 'Well, why can't I?'" 

It wasn't a dramatic epiphany and there were no instant transformations. In fact, her first run was exactly what most people's first run feels like: hard. But it wasn't the run itself that stayed with her, rather what came afterwards. She remembers finishing and realising she'd done something she genuinely hadn't believed she was capable of doing. "The feeling of accomplishment outshadowed how hard it was," she says. "It made me feel amazing. It made me feel super capable."  

That feeling became addictive. Not the physical exertion, nor the medals or race bibs that would eventually follow, but the quiet confidence that comes from proving yourself wrong. Every run chipped away at a belief she'd held for years about who she was. Every mile became evidence that perhaps she'd underestimated herself all along. 

The speed of what followed is remarkable. At the beginning of 2023, Lucy couldn't run 5K. By the end of that same year, she had completed the Berlin Marathon. In between came a half marathon, trained for using an online PDF she'd found and a brand-new pair of HOKA Clifton 8s, the first proper running shoes she'd ever owned. 

Looking back, she laughs at how naturally she slipped into an all-or-nothing mindset. "I knew I wouldn't have the motivation to just get out and go for a run," she admits. "So I signed up for a half marathon because I knew I needed something that would force me to keep doing it." When she crossed that finish line, exhausted after what she still describes as one of the hardest things she's ever done, her conclusion wasn't that she'd reached her limit. Quite the opposite. "I was like, 'Well, I'm halfway there. I might as well sign up for a full marathon.'" 

To anyone else, that leap sounds extraordinary. To Lucy, it felt almost logical. She wasn't chasing marathon glory; she was just running after the feeling running had given her from the very beginning. 

Berlin became much more than her first marathon. It marked a turning point in the way she saw herself. The night before the race, her mum and sister surprised her after travelling across Germany just to be there. They couldn't get a direct flight to Berlin, so they flew into Hamburg before making the long train journey to reach her. It was a gesture that made an already emotional weekend unforgettable, but the real significance came the following day. 

"I always say that running, for me, has been a real physical representation of what I'm capable of," she says. "I truly cannot say enough how much I never thought I'd be able to even run a 5K, let alone a marathon." But then, she asks the question that seems to define everything that followed. "If I've gone from not being able to run to running a marathon, what else can I do in my life?" 

It's difficult to overstate the power of that shift. Running didn't simply make Lucy fitter or faster; it changed the way she approached everything else. Around the same time she completed Berlin, she left her full-time job to pursue content creation. To an outsider, those decisions might seem unrelated. To her, they were inseparable. "If I can do that," she says, referring to marathon training, "I can do this." 

Running became evidence. Whenever work felt overwhelming or self-doubt crept in, she reminded herself that she'd willingly run thirty kilometres before breakfast. Suddenly, difficult conversations, career changes and new opportunities seemed far less intimidating. "Anything is possible," she says. "You just put one foot in front of the other." 

Of course, once you've discovered you're capable of more than you imagined, there's a temptation to keep asking where the limit really is. For Lucy, that curiosity led her towards a half Ironman. On paper, it made perfect sense. If running had transformed her confidence, why not push even further? The race itself was memorable, although perhaps not for all the reasons she'd expected. Swimming training left her bleached hair with an unfortunate green tint, while the sheer volume of preparation demanded by three disciplines quickly revealed a different side of endurance sport. "I think it ventured into feeling a little bit too intense," she reflects. "It took a little bit of the joy away from it." 

That lesson proved just as valuable as finishing the race itself. For the first time, Lucy realised the challenge alone wasn't enough. It wasn't collecting increasingly impressive accomplishments. It was the simple act of running because running made her feel good. That understanding would shape the marathons that followed. 

New York was different from Berlin because the uncertainty had disappeared. She arrived knowing she could finish. Her partner ran alongside her, handing over gels and water, and for the first time she could fully absorb the atmosphere rather than worrying about surviving the distance. "I don't really care how long this takes me," she remembers thinking on the start line. "I know I'll be able to do this." It remains, she says, one of the most enjoyable marathons she's ever run. 

London, however, offered a different lesson. For the first time, she trained with a specific time goal. The process became more structured, more disciplined and, slowly, more consumed by performance than pleasure. Three weeks before race day, she was struck down with flu and couldn't run at all in the final stretch of her build-up. At the time, it felt devastating. Looking back, she sees it differently. "I think I slightly lost the joy for running," she says. "I started focusing a little bit more on the performance side." 

Standing on the London Marathon start line, she made a conscious decision to let go of the stopwatch. She hugged her mum on the course. She stopped for friends. She walked when she wanted to. She looked around instead of looking down at her watch. The result was her slowest marathon. It was also one of her happiest. "I finished that marathon with the biggest smile on my face," she says. "I think it really took me back to why I run." 

It's a sentiment that feels increasingly rare in an era where every run is uploaded, analysed and compared. Social media can make it seem as though every outing needs to be faster than the last, every marathon a personal best and every achievement bigger than the one before. Lucy's story quietly pushes back against that idea. The numbers matter, but only if they don't cost you the reason you started. "I don't run to shave ten minutes off a marathon time," she says. "I run because it makes me feel really good." Ironically, letting go of that obsession with performance is what ultimately led to her best performance of all. 

For Tokyo, she trained hard again. She still had a time goal, but this time she protected the joy just as carefully as she protected the training plan. She ran with friends instead of always running alone. She embraced the social side of the sport. She reminded herself that marathon training wasn't something to endure but something to enjoy. The result was a twenty-minute personal best, crossing the line in 3:33. 

But more importantly, she smiled all the way through it. "I was proud of myself for finding that balance between joy and striving for what I'm capable of," she says. Perhaps that's the real achievement. Not the time itself, but the understanding that ambition and enjoyment don't have to exist at opposite ends of the spectrum. You can work hard without forgetting why you started. You can chase improvement without making the clock your only measure of success. 

It's tempting to look at Lucy Georgia's story and focus on the marathons, the Ironman or the personal bests. Those are the obvious headlines. Yet they were never the point. The races simply became milestones in a much bigger journey; one that started with someone trying to feel a little better during lockdown and ended with someone who fundamentally changed the way she viewed herself. 

Running didn't just make her stronger. It made her believe she was capable. And once you've experienced that feeling, it's hard not to wonder how many of the limits in your own life exist only because you've never questioned them. 

Perhaps that's why so many people keep returning to running, even when it's hard. Not because every run feels good – Lucy would be the first to tell you it doesn't – but because every run offers the possibility of discovering something new about yourself. Sometimes that's resilience. Sometimes it's confidence. Sometimes it's simply the quiet satisfaction of doing something today that yesterday's version of you thought was impossible. 

For Lucy, that's why she runs – to see who she could become.