Born in Manila, Philippines, almost 35 years ago, Jeremiah Maestre moved to America when he was three. His journey, first in boxing and now in ultrarunning, is about inspiring people to find themselves through sports. And even if he’s relatively new to the sport, his 60k followers on Instagram show he’s a great ambassador (@jeremiah.maestre).
You’ve given up pro boxing for ultrarunning, is that right?
I reached a pretty high level in the amateur side of boxing, as I competed at the New York City Golden Gloves and was a boxing and fitness coach on the side. As I was trying to go pro, I decided to switch to endurance training. Boxing is brutal on the body, and there is always the risk of severe head trauma. You don’t think about that when you’re younger and competing. But then you start to have a family and realize that you can only give so much to both. It’s a give-and-take.
What did you love about boxing, and what is the connection with ultra-endurance sports?
I loved what it did to my lifestyle and the mentality that goes with it. I loved the discipline and the training.
Photo courtesy Marathon Des Sables
We met at Marathon Des Sables (MDS) last April. It was your first, and it was my 10th. I’m not going back next year, but you are.
Maybe. MDS was life-changing for me. Everything I had accomplished in life before MDS was through boxing, whether the coaching or the competitive side. I had built my social media community on that boxing side of my life. I went to the root of things and asked myself, what am I without boxing? Furthermore, I realized it was not boxing helping me in my life but more the training, lifestyle, discipline, humility and all the hard work behind it. I stumbled across running and decided to run a marathon in training.
That is a sign that you are an ultrarunner at the core.
I wanted to challenge myself and…I hated it. It took me more than 6 hours. I was trying to get into the competitive world of boxing. I remember it was December 2022, and I wanted to change myself because I didn’t have a year of fighting like I wanted to.
Running a marathon by yourself, in training, to prove a point to yourself, is something only someone who’s into ultrarunning would do.
That’s why I loved MDS. I have so much love for ultrarunning. I must have done six marathons from when I ran that first one to a year later. I’m no expert, but I like documenting it. If I saw someone who had just started boxing telling others to do this or that, I would be turned off. But, you know, I like to document it. I enjoy showing my highs and lows and what I’m learning, and hopefully, that inspires others to challenge themselves.
What got you into Marathon Des Sables?
My old boxing training partner in New York, Brian, started doing these adventure races when he retired from professional boxing. I was in Arizona one day for training in the heat and said, “Whoa, this is hard out here. Let me look for a marathon I could do in similar heat.” And that’s how I stumbled upon the MDS and remembered Brian telling me about it. I was utterly terrified by it. But when I ran my first marathon by myself, I was never thinking, OK, I’m going to stop, I’m going to quit, I’m going to call an Uber. Once I returned to where I started, I wanted to find something more challenging. I wanted to take myself to where I didn’t think I could keep going anymore. From falling in love with the process and the journey of marathon running, I got myself from a 6:15 marathon to 3:35 in the span of a year.
And that is how you became obsessed with MDS?
Oh yes, absolutely. I connected with Elizabeth Barnes, a two-time MDS winner (2015, 2017) who still coaches me now. I came across one of her blogs and found it very informative. She gave me information about the pack, the logistics, when to travel and where to stay. I wouldn’t even call it a race. It’s an adventure—a journey.
For me, as hard as it is physically, the MDS has always been a reset psychologically, a reset for the mind that brings me peace. Do you know what I mean?
I agree. I love stripping myself down to the bare necessities. Being in that desert was so humbling. Talk about taking me to a place where I thought I could not go anymore. The first two stages I thought I was doing OK, being in the top 50 rankings, and then stage three came with its 85.3 kilometers (53 miles) that took me 27 hours. By mile 11, I was walking at a 30 min/mile pace and had 40 more miles to go. Also, at one point in the night, my blisters were so painful that I thought a thorn had gone through my shoe.
Photo courtesy Jeremiah Maestre
That is precisely when you need to tap into your super-human powers. We can talk lightly about it months later, but when you’re in the heat of it, that is when it’s the hardest.
Oh man, we should have these conversations aside from an interview because I cannot have this conversation with people who still need to do MDS. So, during this long stage, my headlamp had no more battery, I kept missing the markings and I didn’t have enough food because I had planned for a sub-16-hour on that stage. I was playing videos of my kids on my phone while I was walking and then, as I reached checkpoint 6, a volunteer tells me that after checkpoint 7 it’s only a 5k to the finish. So, I run with all I have left, thinking I’m going to reach checkpoint 7 and be done with it because, a 5k, right? But when I reach checkpoint 7, they tell me it’s a 10k to the finish. I was so miserable.
You’re good at inspiring people. Do you agree that with a race like MDS, it all comes down to how much you want it?
Coming from a third-world country and living in America, MDS brought back the idea that you can be so happy with nothing. I loved the humbling process behind it, which you can find in boxing, where you can get truly knocked down and feel humbled. I think most people are physically capable of completing this Sahara race. But there needs to be a typical mindset with ultrarunning, which is about having a super strong belief in yourself. If you believe in yourself, you can find a way to put in the work to complete it.
Photo courtesy Marathon Des Sables
Does your past as a semi-pro boxer help you in your ultrarunning adventures? Does it make you more of a tough guy when it’s hard on those trails?
Absolutely. In boxing, in training, you have to simulate a fight, always, which is somebody trying to hurt you, literally. So often in the training you’re in the ring with somebody better than you, and they’re beating you up, but you have to stay in there for another round. I’ve had many of those moments with high-level professional guys trying to take me out. And when I got knocked out, I was standing back up and coming back to the gym the following day. Let me simulate what the race is going to look and feel like. You can run on tired legs, for example. So yes, that has helped me because I know I have to replicate the fight in the training or the race as much as possible. And where do I get that drive? Part of it is that I’m an immigrant. I’m someone who was born in the Philippines and got lucky. Not everybody gets those opportunities. How blessed am I to get those opportunities? I’m not going to let them go. I will keep trying and trying as much as I can until I can’t anymore.
Every time I have completed a difficult ultra in the past, it has given me an extra ego boost. It has helped me in my daily life with all the obstacles and everything thrown at me all the time, whatever it may be. Do you feel that too?
Yes, that’s why I love coaching boxing so much. I bring boxing to everyday people who won’t naturally step into a ring to fight with another human being. Ultimately, those races, like boxing, change you outside the trail and the ring.
One of the similarities between running and boxing is the simplicity of it. Technically, in terms of gear, you don’t need much. Are you a freak or a geek regarding your ultrarunning?
I was at the beginning when I started running marathons, but now that I’ve stepped into the world of ultrarunning, I realize you don’t need much to challenge yourself and find that fulfillment.