No one is born a perfect runner. And none of us will become one. But through incremental steps, we can become better runners. And that's the beauty of our sport: There are no shortcuts, nothing is given to us; we earn every mile, and we earn every result.

'Everyone is an athlete,' wrote the late George Sheehan, running's physician-philosopher. 'The only difference is that some of us are in training, and some are not.' Lifelong runners are in lifelong training. For us, the cliche has become the rule: Running isn't a sport, it's a lifestyle. At a certain point, running stops being about PRs, victories, or new highs in training volume. It becomes a part of who we are. It becomes something our bodies can do, rather than something we do to our bodies.

No single workout better prepares us for a goal race than a tune-up race. While we can simulate many of the physical demands of racing by running hard intervals or a time trial, that simulation is far removed from the experience of toeing the line. Racing is about nerves. And confidence. And self-control. It's about the ability to deal with inadequate parking, delayed start times, bad weather, a shortage of porta-potties, and any other obstacle that crops up in a race environment. And, of course, it's about putting the mental and physical pieces together to produce our best performance. Tune-up races prepare us for all of this, both melding the elements of our training fitness and familiarizing us with the situational aspects of race day.