I Do It Cause I Can

The following motivational story is not about me, knowing I was part of it. This story is about 2 very special friends of mine, who blew my mind away when they attempted and finished the Dubai Marathon 2017 without any excuse!

I received a call from Ghaith telling me he’s registered for Dubai Marathon 2017 with Mohammed Kasim, and asked me to join them. I rejected as I do not like running what so ever!

Let me give you a bit of background on both Mohammed Kasim and Ghaith Al Daker, and why I am writing about them:

I met Mo Kasim at InnerFight. He’s fit, trains hard and trains multiple times a day, that’s all what I knew. Then I was WOWed by his jaw-dropping story when I got to know him. Kasim has put tremendous physical and mental strength for the past 3 years to lose over 100kgs and transform to an inspirational figure.

Mo Kasim then…

Mo Kasim now…

Ghaith, a friend from university, was around 120Kgs last year!!! With passion and dedication – though he annoys me with his social media posts about his workouts – he has transformed to an 85kg fit-machine! He’s a living role model.

Ghaith then…

Ghaith now…

Now you know their inspirational transformation, you know why I want to write about them. If you still didn’t figure it out, it is because both of them believed they can lose weight, and become fit. It is also because they have motivated me.

Few days later, I joined them for a practice run, one joke led to another and next thing I registered to the Dubai marathon 2017 myself. Yes I did, I told you they have motivated me. If they could do it, why on earth shouldn’t I be inspired to join [silently I said to myself].

The D-day has arrived and as we lined up on the starting line, I felt proud to be among these 2 friends, just by being there. I realized that we all have excuses, but what makes greatness is the simple choice we make, the choice whether we let these excuses destroy us mentally then physically, or the choice of overcoming them. The choice is yours and no it is not hard !!!

I will spare you the details of the Marathon run itself, but I will summarize it in few phrases.

It was motivating and kept me going, seeing Ghaith & Kasim determination to finish the marathon no matter what was uplifting (except that Ghaith had a serious face all race-long and wouldn’t entertain any of my jokes 😛 ). I felt better and stronger about myself. And yes we finished it. And we finished it strong without a damn excuse !

Follow these 2 in their future races. They are both training for Ironman and Triathlon races.

I hope this short story has inspired many of you. Bottom line, the deal is simple to achieve what you truly want:

• You have to really want it
• Use no excuse
• Believe that you can
• Prepare
• And go for it…

Now repeat this moto to yourself:

“I DO IT CAUSE I CAN”