Daniel Sedin: Three hours later, I’m looking at the next Marathon…
I want to try this one again
Henrik: We set a goal to beat three hours… so we might run until we do that.
Turns out the rumours were true: Henrik & Daniel Sedin ran their first Marathon this past Sunday.
After retiring from the National Hockey League last season, the Canuck legends spent their first season off training for the annual BMO Vancouver Marathon, Canada’s largest Marathon event.
“We had this date on our mind for quite some time,” shares Daniel, in an interview with Sportsnet 650.
This year’s edition of Vancouver’s only Marathon event saw record sell-out numbers featuring 18,000+ participants from nearly 65 countries.
Daniel finished in the top 200 of all finishers at Vancouver’s only Marathon with a time of 3:11:45, while Henrik followed in 3:24:11. But Daniel vows to go faster still.
“I said, ‘this is the worst thing I’ve ever done’,” jokes Daniel. “Then three hours later, I’m looking at the next marathon run – so you forget quick.”
Listen to the full interview online with Sportsnet.
Both Henrik Sedin and Daniel Sedin also had follow-up interviews with Sportsnet before heading to the BC Sports Hall of Fame.
“I loved it,” says Henrik Sedin.
“Even though we’re not world-class Marathon runners, it’s still a competition and it brings out a little bit of that competitor in both of us.
Henrik & Daniel Sedin at the Start Line of the 2019 BMO Vancouver Marathon. Photo: Christopher Morris / RUNVAN®
Henrik Sedin finishes strong in the last KMs of the BMO Vancouver Marathon. Photo: Darryl Dyck / RUNVAN®
Daniel Sedin finished with an impressive time of 3:11:45. Photo: Richard Lam / RUNVAN®
May 7, 2019 – Canuck Central @ Noon
Daniel Sedin Interview
AA: So the Marathon – first marathon complete. You’re a couple days out from it. How you feeling?
DS: Pretty good, legs sore, not feeling very good, but it was a great experience, certainly going to do it again, and yeah – it was awesome.
AA: I was going to ask you that. So you want to do it again, next year? As soon as next year?
DS: Yeah, oh yeah, absolutely. I might get another one in between too, but I want to try this one again because it’s, I mean, it was perfect too. The weather was good, no wind, and it was a great experience.
AA: What did you learn about training for that, that you maybe didn’t expect? You’ve trained for the same thing for years and years and years and all of a sudden this is something completely different. What did you learn that maybe surprised you or what were some of the differences?
DS: I think, running slow – slow and long. We’re so used to always pushing hard every – every training session needs to be hard, but now you got to go for long runs. They have to be slow, you got to get the time in, and I think that was our biggest mistake training for this. I think we always push a little bit too hard so we didn’t get those long runs in and that’s why by 35KM our legs gave up on us – had to walk for a bit.
SS: But you learn from this, and would you want to run more marathons; if you run it next time, you’ll probably feel a lot better prepared for how to prepare for it.
DS: Yeah, and people said, too, this is your first marathon don’t – I mean, you can learn a lot from that, and I think we did too. Our goal always before was to do a sub-3 hour, and we failed that one.
SS: Well close enough!
DS: Well I don’t know, 11 minutes, that’s a lot of minutes.
SS: Well when you go three hours, I don’t know if 11 minutes is a lot but at that level, but yeah, at that level, I can see it being a lot of time.
DS: It is a lot. So, I think it will be fun to try it again and maybe have a different training plan and even the race too. I think we maybe start out a little too fast, but overall, like I said, it was a great experience.
SS: Would you consider trying to qualify for something, like say, the Boston Marathon? And I know that’s coming up in September so you’d have to run again to get the qualifying time but like Patrick Johnson, a good friend of the show, mentioned on social media next year, because of the age, it’ll be 3 hours and 5 minutes. Is that something you’ll be trying to do?
DS: Perfect. We’ll wait until next year. No, I think sub-3 hours is our main goal, I think it’s kind of the magic number for us. If we qualify, we might think about it, but I think it’s the whole thing too, it’s not only the marathon, it’s training for it, it’s having a plan, being injury free, and taking care of your body, it reminds you a lot about training for the NHL season in a way, so, that’s what we like to do.
AA: Well I feel a little bit bad bringing this up – Henrik declined the request to come, so it’s kind of on him but a lot of people were asking about the fact — you guys did a trail race last year and you finished about a couple seconds apart. And this time, you finished a little bit ahead of Henrik and, at what point did you just say see ya buddy? Like I’m going for it.
DS: All of a sudden he was gone, he was way behind me. We talked after the race, and for a long time he wasn’t too far behind, but I thought he was done for sure. So, I think he did the bigger effort in finishing the race because he hit the wall earlier than I did. So, kudos to him, he did good.
AA: Well I sent it to you, our very own Scott Rintoul was there at the Finish Line, and he actually took a video of Daniel crossing. Scott didn’t race this year, because he actually ran two marathons last year because I think he carried John Jang.
SS: Did he not?
AA: Yeah, so I think that counts as two. Plus, it took them like 6 hours, I think, so that’s like four marathons.
SS: Yeah, that’s our perspective because you say 11 minutes is a lot, well we had someone run a marathon in 6 hours so 11 minutes doesn’t seem like a lot.
AA: But I thought that was pretty cool and you responded when I sent that to you and were like it was the worst thing you’ve ever done, so how grueling is it, that last little bit? Do you just want to stop or do you know people are there watching, know you’re doing it, I mean giving up on it would be almost impossible right?
DS: Yeah, especially when you have that three hour – you want to hit three hours. Realizing that you’re not going to be able to make it, that’s the toughest thing, I think. And that kind of, when you have that set goal you want to aim for, once you realize you’re not going to be able to do it, that’s when you kind of, I don’t want to say give up, but you kind of lose the little extra that you need to push yourself.
Henrik and Daniel look spent after the 2019 BMO Vancouver Marathon. Photo: Christopher Morris / RUNVAN®
AA: So it was – and I don’t know if everyone knows – it was a family affair beyond just you and Henrik, like your other brother, Peter, ran it as well, your wife, Marionette ran the Half. When did Peter come over and how much was he training, I guess on his own? When did he decide he was going to take part in this?
DS: Yeah, I mean we are four brothers and all of us are pretty competitive and we like to workout. Our oldest, he likes to do a lot of mountain biking, doesn’t run that much. Peter’s kind of both biking and running, and we’re, same with me and Henrik. So we talked about it and I think it was December when we went home for Christmas there and he said, yeah ‘sure’. And his wife ran the 8KM as well, my wife ran the Half. So it was awesome. And Peter actually broke his ribs six weeks ago maybe?
AA: Oh wow, but he followed through with it.
DS: And then actually he flew home to Sweden Sunday night, so he had a rough –
AA: So he’s cramping up right now?
SS: Try to get up and start walking after running a marathon and then being on a flight for ten hours.
DS: Yeah, no he actually had a rough few days.
AA: That’s not optimal recovery.
SS: No probably not. So, what is more grueling from after the fact – a 7-game playoff series or running a marathon? Just from how your body feels afterwards.
DS: It’s different because the Stanley Cup is over such a long period of time, and then when that ends, it just, you’re empty. Marathon, I mean, it’s for three hours, and you’re actually feeling pretty good for 25 of those 42KM, so it’s just the last 10, 15KM that really pushes you. So, it’s a different kind of feeling, but yeah, I texted Alex and I said that “this is the worst thing I’ve ever done”. Then three hours later and I’m looking at the next marathon run (laughs) so you forget quick.
SS: It’s the pain, but it’s also what you mentioned before. You guys like to train and I’m sure leaving the game and then trying to stay physically active and driven at the same time, how much did that help this past year to run the trail run, doing the training for the marathon, running the marathon, how did that make the transition go?
DS: I think easier for sure. We had this date on our mind for quite some time, we had to do the training, we had a goal we wanted to hit, obviously we failed, but hopefully we can get there one day, so I think it helped a lot. Just knowing that you had to get up every day and do the training. I know for us, I have so much respect for people who have to work every day and then get the runs in, and be so good. I think for us we went for runs and then we could go home and have lunch, and do whatever. So, we had a lot of time on our hands to train. And we still failed.
SS: Next one, you’ll get the next one. It’s like the same as the first time you made the playoffs, it took a few years before you had some success right, so fail the first time, do better the next time.
DS: Yeah, that’s what people told us too. First one should just be about learning to run that distance and how to train for it and everything, so we’ll do better.”
Huge thanks again to Sportsnet for the interview which you may catch at sportsnet.ca/650/canucks-central-at-noon/daniel-sedin-running-marathons
“We always enjoyed running, even as part of our summer workouts,” adds Henrik in the follow-up interview.
“You set a goal and then you train for it,” says Henrik. “That was our mind-sight for hockey as well.”
“We set a goal to beat three hours and we didn’t do it the first-time, so we might run until we do that.”
“I’m really motivated right now,” jokes Henrik. “I’m going to beat him for sure.”