Tristan Miller

Tristan Miller's Biography

Tristan Miller is "that guy", the one who ran 52 international marathons in 52 weeks in 2010. Tristan Miller spent many years working in ad sales, before the "call of the wild" took hold. In the Global Economic Crisis of 2009/10, Tristan lost his job at Google when they shut down the Melbourne office. Instead of looking for a new job, he decided to take on a new challenge.

He sold everything, laid out an extraordinary strategy and left Australian shores to attempt to run 52 marathons in 52 weeks - 42 countries, 7 continents - raising money for the charities, UNICEF and Facing Africa. Tristan's crazy idea turned into an epic journey as he traipsed the world, mostly alone, to see what it was like to run around the planet. He ran in all the major international marathons, including New York, London, Berlin and Tokyo, but also found himself in Rwanda, Mongolia and on Easter Island, in Chile, to name a few. He even ran across the frozen fields of Antarctica!

His tales of heroism and misfortune are dynamic and engaging. His ability to sift through the lessons of his year and give insight into the profound changes that he went through has audiences engrossed in the story. Tristan even captured many of these moments on video, as he carried a camera while he was running in every corner of the world, making his presentation visually entertaining.

Tristan made national headlines before he left and then again on his return to Australia and his name has been in print in many languages around the world, creating thousands of avid international followers. His website, RunLikeCrazy.com, and Facebook page has huge numbers of regular visitors all now wondering, what's next for this rising hero of running?

Tristan's story shows that a very regular guy can do incredible things with the right motivation. He'll have people so inspired by the end of his talk they'll believe they can take on the world too!

Speaking Topics Include

Life Is A Marathon

Tristan’s inspirational keynote is based on life stories. He found the path to the marathon start line was as much a part of the journey as the race itself. Achieving the goal is only a slice of the total experience. And he found this reflected in every aspect of life and started to lay out each hurdle he faced with the same planning and gusto that he did with his marathons. With the right planning and determination, anything is possible. Just take time and apply continued pressure to succeed in the biggest challenges of your life.

This Too Shall Pass

When all the chips are down and you’re not sure how you’ll go on, just focus on the next few steps toward your goal and keep going, the worst will pass and you’ll emerge stronger and closer to the finish line. Unfortunately we all face periods of adversity in our lives. Sometimes they’re professional hurdles and sometimes they’re personal issues. Usually there are strong links between the two, even though we try so very hard to keep our work and home lives separate. It’s important to recognise that this period will pass. Tristan shows that we can do little things in our personal lives to help us shift the tide and find our way back into a positive space. He links to physical well being to emotional stability, then connects the dots to professional drive and success.

Celebrate your wins

Often the finish line is well beyond sight, so Tristan shows through his stories how to break the journey down into achievable goals and give up a cheer as you pass each milestone. After all, we learn more from the journey than from achieving the goal itself. In fact, Tristan explains how we learn more from a spectacular failure than we do from an easy win. If success comes easily, then we don’t take the time to analyse how we got to the destination so well. But if the journey is difficult and the finish line not quite what we anticipate, we look back at the steps we took and understand the patterns of failure, then we can uncover a strategy for success!!

Embrace your mistakes

‘Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.’ – Albert Einstein

Tristan pushes people to be bold enough to earn their lessons by making a few big mistakes. He believes that it’s the mistakes he’s made in the past that has strengthened his resolve to succeed in the future. We’ve become far too afraid to make the wrong moves in life, so our culture is to remain reserved and cautious. The truth is, we need to make mistakes to learn faster. The more mistakes you make in a year, the faster you’ll get them out the way and become the success you desire! On the other hand, if you keep reading from someone else’s playbook, you’ll never really figure out what’s right for you.

Don’t be afraid to let go

The only real thing that stops us trying something new is fear of failure, or losing what we have. Accept that you may lose everything and fear will no longer rule your decisions.

By the end, Tristan’s feet toes had been infected, he was coughing up blood from a chest infection, he had numerous strains and he couldn’t get enough food into his system. He’d been robbed, had chronic jetlag, was completely broke and experienced near depressive states of loneliness. But Tristan knew he would face all of these things when he started, so had already accepted them before they happened. Tristan explains how to come to grips with your fear, by planning for the worst and hoping for the best. In doing so, we’re able to get started with our grand adventures without giving in to our debilitating, and often unwarranted, fears.

Life Is Made Up Of ‘Best Laid Plans’

You’ve got to have a plan to head in the right direction, but be prepared for the outcome to be more than you expected. Tristan is a big proponent for accepting that any plan is often a wish list. If everything goes according to plan, then you’ll probably get the desired outcome. But usually the journey has some unexpected twists and turns, so it’s worth accepting that things are likely to go pear shaped. Once you get comfortable with this, you can take each ride as an adventure, knowing that you’ll have significant learnings at the end that will help shape your successful future plans!

Catalyst For Change

Every event in our lives can be seen in two ways – Obstacle or Opportunity. Tristan’s keynote helps us understand that we need to keep our eyes open for the windows of opportunity that come with each twist and turn in life. These events are a catalyst for change. Change often creates fear and anxiety, both in our personal lives and through corporate evolution. Embracing change and looking forward to the outcome sounds great, but it’s hard to accept the period of adjustment that comes first. Tristan tempts listeners to be brave when confronted with change. He shows that being outside your comfort zone allows us to experience new things – to learn, to grow, to become more than we were before the wave of change.