It was Gen. George Patton, who said "Courage is fear holding on for a minute longer."

That certainly was the case when the 33 Chilean miners were trapped 2,300 feet underground in a gold and copper mine for more than two months before being rescued. Their 69-day ordeal - 18 days of which they managed to sustain themselves with two mouthfuls of tuna and half a glass of milk every 48 hours - is the longest anyone has been trapped underground and lived.The motivation and makeup of persons who act heroically under times of extreme duress is remarkable. What makes a firefighter rush into a burning building to save a trapped person, or causes a soldier to disregard his own personal safety and fall on a grenade to shield his comrades?One analyst I read felt that people with a strong sense of themselves, with a moral compass, and strong identification with people can be heroic, because they know that they are part of the whole.That description would fit the 33 miners involved in the mine collapse three months ago in Chile. It was also explained that when people are hit with adrenaline and fear, they often become stunned into immobility. Although adrenaline increases muscle strength, it can reduce muscle control and often, running away is the easiest recourse.Although he didn't run away, running was a formula that helped save Edison Pena, one of the trapped miners in Chile. Before being entombed in the earth, Pena had been an occasional runner and also rode his bike to work. Using pliers, he cut his knee-high work boots down to his ankles and, wearing his boots and headlamp, ran up to six miles a day in stifling heat up and down the three pitch-black tunnels."When I ran in the darkness I was running for life," he said.For even more resistance, he strapped telephone cable around his waist in order to drag a wooden pallet behind him.Pena said the workout regimen was a form of therapy that gave him physical and spiritual sustenance."I was running to show I wasn't just waiting around - that I would be an active participant in my own salvation,'' he said. "I wanted God to see that I really wanted to live.''Pena, 34, has never run a marathon, but this Sunday, 25 days after his rescue from the mine, Pena will be running 26.2 miles with 43,000 others in the New York City Marathon.Until he arrived in New York on Thursday, he had never been outside of Chile. He quickly received the star treatment in the Big Apple, and last night, during an appearance on The David Letterman Show, he entertained the audience with an impersonation of Elvis, his favorite singer."People say we're heroes, but I don't think we are," he explained. "It's just what destiny had in store for us. We had a slim possibility of surviving and we did.''Pena said that while the marathon is a challenge, the biggest challenge he now faces is how to motivate others.It seems clear to many of us that he's already accomplished that.