Live fish fight to go upstream, dead fish float downstream. Paul says he finished the race and kept the faith. IOW, he gave it all he had.
Except Paul was never mainstream, part of the crowd, and he fought hard to correct bad doctrine. Finishing the race is not going against the flow in the stream.it “Come out of her my people”, “avoid them”
(2 Corinthians 6:17 [KJV])
Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you,
We are alive in Christ, not in the mainstream. That race was not done by staying with the hereticks, but rather exposing them and warning about them.