By Frank Arndt, Senior Partner of Paradigm Family Law, former marathon runner and volleyball coach.
Every year, as the London Marathon approaches, I notice the same shift in atmosphere.
Excitement builds across London, but among runners there is always another emotion underneath it: nerves. Quiet nerves. The kind that come from knowing the training is done and the only thing left is the long road ahead.
I know that feeling well.
Before injury ended that chapter, marathon running formed a significant part of my life. It was never simply exercise. Running gave me thinking space. It gave me discipline. It gave me perspective when life felt noisy.
Most of all, it taught me one important lesson: difficult journeys are never managed well by panic.
That lesson has stayed with me throughout my career as a family lawyer.
These days, when I am not practising family law, I spend much of my spare time coaching volleyball. It is a very different sport, but the same principles appear again and again. Under pressure, the strongest players are rarely the ones who react fastest. They are usually the ones who stay composed and deploy effort carefully.
Over the years, I have become increasingly aware that both sports have quietly shaped how I look at divorce.
Because divorce places people under a form of pressure they are rarely prepared for. It is emotionally tiring, financially uncertain and often far slower than they expect. Yet many people begin it with the same instinctive mistake seen in sport: they try to spend everything at the start.
It is often the beginning that throws people off balance
The beginning of divorce can feel energised simply because something is finally happening.
Solicitors are instructed. Letters begin arriving. Financial questions are asked. Positions are set out. After months, and sometimes years, of uncertainty behind closed doors, the legal machinery suddenly starts moving.
That movement can create a powerful illusion that speed now matters above all else.
Many people feel they must answer every point immediately, challenge every assertion robustly and push hard from the outset because action feels preferable to waiting.
Marathon runners know that feeling.
The first miles can make you feel stronger than you really are. The crowd is loud, the adrenaline is high and the temptation is to surge because standing still feels impossible. However, experienced runners know that this is often where races are quietly compromised. Too much effort spent too early has consequences later, when the road becomes longer, quieter and far less forgiving.
Similarly, divorce can be managed badly in exactly the same way.
A client who reacts to every provocation, treats every incoming letter as a fresh emergency and allows legal energy to be consumed on every skirmish often reaches the more decisive stages exhausted — financially, emotionally or both.
Family courts do not reward the person who looks most forceful in the early exchanges. More often, they favour the person who remains measured, organised and focused on the eventual outcome.
That is particularly true once the case moves into the formal stages of financial remedy proceedings, where preparation matters far more than noise.
The long middle is where divorce endurance really matters
Any runner will tell you that the true test of a marathon is not at the beginning and not even at the finish.
It sits in the long middle stretch, when the novelty has worn off and there is still a considerable distance left to cover.
Divorce has its own version of those middle miles.
Disclosure drags on, valuations take time, pension reports are awaited, business figures are analysed, negotiations move in small increments and clients begin to feel that life has become suspended in procedural slow motion.
This stage can feel deeply frustrating because there is often a great deal happening legally without the emotional satisfaction of obvious progress.
As a result, tired people become more reactive. They become more sensitive to provocation, more eager to force movement and more tempted to spend money on points that may feel important psychologically but make very little difference to the eventual settlement.
Yet some of the strongest outcomes in family law are built precisely here.
Here, evidence takes shape. Financial reality becomes clearer. Most importantly, a sensible strategy either holds together or starts to drift.
The work may feel slow. However, that slow work often determines the finish. Clients are often surprised by how much of divorce is shaped in these procedural stages rather than in one dramatic hearing, particularly where pensions, property and disclosure remain unresolved.
Good outcomes are rarely produced by chaos
Coaching volleyball has reinforced that lesson for me repeatedly.
From the outside, spectators often notice only the final dramatic point. What they do not always see is the controlled sequence that made it possible: positioning, communication, trust and the discipline not to lunge at the wrong ball.
Chaotic effort looks energetic.
Structured effort wins matches.
Divorce is much the same.
Because it is so personal, clients naturally experience each new development emotionally. A difficult letter from the other side does not feel like paperwork; it feels like an attack. Delay feels insulting. A poor proposal feels provocative. The temptation is to react to each moment as it arrives.
Yet a legal case run entirely from the emotional centre quickly becomes expensive and directionless.
There has to be somebody keeping sight of the whole court.
There has to be somebody asking not simply how we answer this, but whether this actually advances the end position we are trying to reach.
At times, pressure should be applied. In other situations, resources should be saved. That approach is not weakness.
It is controlled deployment of effort.
And in both sport and divorce, controlled effort usually outperforms panic. This is also why early legal clarity on likely outcomes can significantly reduce unnecessary escalation.
The people who finish strongest are not always the people who felt strongest
As London prepares for another marathon, spectators will watch runners cross the finish line and see only the visible moment of relief, exhaustion and achievement.
The London Marathon has become the world’s largest annual one-day fundraising event and one of the clearest public demonstrations of endurance under pressure.
However, spectators will not see the quieter decisions that made that finish possible: the mornings nobody applauded, the miles where discipline replaced enthusiasm, the judgment not to waste energy when immediate comfort was tempting.
Divorce often works in exactly the same hidden way. Frank explains;
“The clients who come through divorce in the strongest position are rarely the ones who reacted hardest at the beginning. They are usually the ones who kept enough discipline to think long term when the process became tiring.”
Of course, divorce is never emotionally easy.
However, it becomes far more manageable when clients stop treating it as a series of emergencies and start treating it as one connected journey towards a workable end result.
In many cases, divorce endurance becomes the single biggest factor separating a measured outcome from an expensive reactive one.
How Paradigm Family Law can help
At Paradigm Family Law, we help clients navigate divorce with long-view strategy rather than short-term reaction. Whether your case involves financial remedy, business interests, pensions, international assets or arrangements concerning children, we focus on measured legal judgment at every stage.
Frank Arndt is Senior Partner and Founder of Paradigm Family Law LLP, dual-qualified in England & Wales and Germany, a trained mediator, qualified judge, former marathon runner and active volleyball coach.
We offer a free initial consultation and fixed-fee clarity on next steps where appropriate. For a confidential discussion about your situation, contact Frank Arndt or Evelyn Peacock, call 01904 217225 or email info@paradigmfamilylaw.co.uk.
Additional reading
For additional reading on financial remedy strategy and complex divorce litigation, see our wider commentary and case analysis across the Paradigm Family Law library:
Sorting Money and Property in Divorce; Insights Every Couple Should Know
Frank Arndt Recommended in Doyle’s Guide 2026. London’s Leading Family Lawyers
