the limit

We are here with Christian Calabrese for IM Italian magazine, and I ask you to introduce yourself to our readers or whoever listens to this interview.

Hello, I am Christian Calabrese, an ultra-marathon runner; I am 48 years old, and my job is as an intensive care nurse in the critical area.

Well, I wanted to do this interview a little playing with words, and maybe, you can give those numbers a sense of both: sport and life experience. Here I would like to start with the word limit. What does this word evoke in you?

Thank you for the question. The word limit, for me, is powerful. Let’s say that my entire life story as an ultra-marathon runner is based on the one that revolves around this word. Here it is of life because in addition to having had an everyday life, let’s say in quotes, always, I have been a sportsman, an ordinary family life, with a daughter to raise, everything.

When in 2017, I ran into a nasty disease which is renal cell carcinoma, and from there, this event I solved well; everything went well; I solved this event; it was a catalytic event that got me, exposed me, and let’s say that I tried to push my limits as an athlete. So from simple marathon runner to ultra-marathon runner with distances over 100 kilometers.

In short, it was an event that taught me to think about ordinary life and not to live according to standard canons. I have a life, let’s say normal, the classic everyday life, but by setting myself big goals, I am slowly trying to achieve them. An experience, in short, to say touching and, simultaneously, completely changes the basis from which we start.

And what else, let’s say beyond the limit, is another word that somehow is very much linked. It is very much related to the type of sport you are practicing: perseverance.

Yes, then that’s the limit. The limit that accompanies me is the stimulation in each preparation, for each ultra, for each ultramarathon. But without perseverance, it isn’t easy to reach this limit. Let’s say that the ultramarathon is a sport that involves every sphere of one’s life, of one’s life, from the management of family dynamics to work. As I said, I work as a nurse in the clinic, so I do 12-hour shifts with nights and perseverance.