Motivation Quote by Michael East

“Stepping up a gear during any race is not an easy thing to do” lands with the quiet authority of someone who’s lived inside the seconds most spectators treat as inevitable. Michael East isn’t romanticizing grit; he’s demystifying the moment fans love to mythologize: the surge. In track culture, “change of gear” is shorthand for that seemingly magical acceleration when the field is strung out, lungs are burning, and the race stops being a plan and becomes a reckoning. East punctures the fantasy that you can simply decide to go faster.

The intent is practical, almost instructional. He’s naming a constraint: physiology and psychology both push back when you ask for more than your body has budgeted. That’s why the line resonates beyond running. It reframes “try harder” as a naive command and replaces it with a more honest model of performance: you can’t will a surge you haven’t trained, rehearsed, and tactically set up. The subtext is a critique of lazy narratives around clutch athletes, the idea that champions just have an extra switch. East implies the “switch” is built through repetitions, race craft, and the painful patience of holding back early so there’s something left to spend.

Context matters: in middle- and long-distance racing, the decisive move often happens when everyone is already near their limit. “Any race” widens the claim into a philosophy of competition: the hardest part isn’t starting strong, it’s finding a new level when the first one is already collapsing.