So Jake's next days were a lot of training with trainer Davis, in which Jake increased his daily training to 45 km which was the maximum he could handle today, even so, he was very happy with the satisfactory training he was having.
On those days Jake also invited Kate to go out with him almost every day and as long as he felt that she enjoyed meeting with him, Jake would continue to ask almost every day, and it seemed that Kate enjoyed these meetings as much as he did.
Jake took Kate to several restaurants that had different menus and always for lunch, Jake also always sent flowers, chocolates, and stuffed animals as gifts to Kate's hotel, and it seemed that she liked that too.
After a few weeks, Jake started taking Kate to other types of dates like going to the movies, to the theater, to the park to have a picnic, to the beach and to various places that Jake knew and wanted to share with Kate.
After several weeks of dating, Jake thought he liked Kate even more and also knew her a lot more than before and so Jake thought he made the right decision to go out on several dates with her before asking her to date with him.
Jake's strategy was that even though he asked Kate to meet him several times, he never asked her to go to dinner with him, and he thought of asking her to go to dinner with him only when he intended to ask her to date him.
But before that the day of the Chicago marathon was approaching, Jake trained every day and no longer suffered from running at this intense pace the 45 km, of course, it would not be at this pace that Jake would run the Chicago marathon and therefore missing a week to the Jake marathon returned to his old training pace by running 50 km.
Running at his old pace Jake found it much easier and had almost no fatigue for himself running 50 km, but of course Jake knew it was necessary, Jake warned his mother and Kate that he was going to Chicago to run the marathon there and the two understood.
This time as he had time Jake went to Chicago two days before the marathon at a hotel he had booked for himself because it was the same hotel he went to compete in the marathon every year and Jake had become a VIP customer at that hotel.
Jake also made reservations at this hotel for Coach Davis who went with him from Miami and also for Zack and his former roommates who would come from the university to see Jake and Zack running in the marathon.
Jake missed his friends William and Aaron and of course Zack too, Jake invited Zack's family too, but everyone was busy and said they would go when Zack ran in a marathon closer to where they lived.
Zack could already run any marathon and finish, but his goal that year was to run a marathon in less than 3 hours, and since he had already agreed with Jake that he would go again to the Chicago marathon, he didn't want to risk running in another marathon that year to get tired.
But in the next few years, Zack didn't intend to go back to Chicago anymore and he would just run in cities in North Carolina and force his family to watch his marathons, Jake didn't think it was that serious because he didn't even ask his mother to watch his marathons.
This time, unlike in recent years, everyone expected Jake to participate in this marathon in Chicago because Jake had done it in recent years and now the NBA season was rarely happening.
Jake had just run the Tokyo marathon that year and had won well and everyone expected Jake to win that marathon again and perhaps break the world record, Adidas and Gatorade had sent sponsors to Chicago and so everyone was even more sure that Jake would run in Chicago.
Of course, the Chicago marathon organizers already knew that Jake was going to participate, but they wanted to keep it a secret because they knew that Jake didn't normally announce when he would run any marathon.
Jake was running for the first time with Adidas sneakers and Adidas clothes, as Jake was committed to sponsorship he was even wearing an Adidas bandana, this was also the first time he was free to talk about his sponsors.
That's because in his time at university, Jake was forbidden to speak on behalf of the companies that sponsored him because he could only receive sponsorship because the university had specifically allowed this for Jake.
With one day left before the Chicago marathon, Zack and the others finally arrived and met Jake at the hotel where they would stay, his friends were impressed with the hotel where they would stay.
"Hi my friends, I missed you in the last few months."
"Hi Jake, we saw the NBA draft this year, congratulations on being the first pick and still playing for the Los Angeles Lakers."
"It's true, it is said that the Los Angeles Lakers team had already negotiated with the Los Angeles Clippers team to choose Jake in the first pick, this is even more incredible."
"Yes, it's a shame that the NBA season has been postponed and maybe it won't even happen, I miss watching the games."
"It's true, I miss the games too, I'm so sorry Jake that this happened in his first season in the NBA."
"It's okay, I had more time to do my thing thanks to that, and I believe that we will still have this NBA season, but we will only have games next year if these discussions continue."
With Jake saying that his friends started to wonder if Jake had inside information because he was a professional player and they were excited, of course, Jake had inside information, but it was because he knew the future and not because he was a professional player.
"But let's change the subject, Zack, do you think you're ready for this marathon?"
"Yes, I am confident that I will be able to run this marathon in less than three hours, because I did it once in training with Coach Davis before he left for Miami, so I am confident."
While Jake was in Australia filming he asked Coach Davis to stay at the university and continue teaching Zack until Jake returned to Miami, as Coach Davis was paid by Jake on a monthly basis and also liked Zack he accepted and helped Zack a lot in the latter months.
Coach Davis had even praised Zack saying he had the potential to become a professional marathon runner, of course after watching Jake run a marathon in just over 2 hours, it was difficult for Coach Davis to remain impressed with Zack.
After that they continued to talk about things that happened in the last few months, Jake talked about filming in Australia and they were all interested in watching the movie, Jake said he had bought a house in Los Angeles and invited them to see it in the future.
Of course, Jake didn't say about his business in Silicon Valley or about Kate, after all, Jake didn't want to expose Kate and they hadn't started dating yet and Jake didn't want to take any chances or tell his friends.
Another subject they talked about was the Tar Heels team, after all, even though Jake and almost all the players had left the team this season, the record of games being lost by the team would still continue next season.
Jake said he was confident that the current team would still be able to maintain that record until completing more than 70 games without losing which would make that record even more exciting, the others were not as optimistic as Jake and thought that the Tar Heels team would lose after two or three games.
They still talked at night and then everyone went to sleep because Jake and Zack had to run the marathon the next day and so they had to rest well to be prepared for the marathon.
The other day in the morning everyone woke up and left the hotel early to go to the place where the marathon would take place, as soon as they arrived the others went to where the crowd was and only Jake and Zack went to where the competitors were.
As soon as Jake arrived in the competitors' area there were athletes who started to recognize him because they expected Jake to participate in this marathon, some said that he would no longer run in marathons after entering the NBA because he already had a very high salary.
But most did not believe it because he had already won a gold medal at an Olympics and athletics world and would not give up just because he no longer needed the marathons to make money.
And that almost became true, of course, Jake still wanted to run the marathons and didn't really care about the money, but it was because with NBA games he normally wouldn't have time to compete in several marathons a year.
Maybe Jake wouldn't even be able to participate in this Chicago marathon any more if the Los Angeles Lakers team coach didn't allow it, of course, Jake would still run another marathon during the year and would run every Olympics.
"Good luck with that marathon, Zack, I trust you will be able to run that marathon in less than three hours."
"I also believe, to achieve this I am going to do something I always wanted to do and I think I am capable of that now."
"And what is this?"
"I will do like everyone else and run in the same group like you in the marathon and thus follow you for more than 15 km and then continue the marathon at my pace and so I will finish in less than 3 hours."
"If you really think you can follow my pace for 15 km and still finish the marathon at your pace, I approve of your idea."
