Run to Win

I enjoy running marathons, and plan on running at least one in every state. I have picked up a few tips and tricks along the way as I find out what works for me and what does not. This series of articles originally began as some random tips off of the top of my head that I knew my friends would read before their first marathon. Why should they make the same sorts of mistakes that I have, when a little foreknowledge could make it easier for them?

Well, through a random happenstance, the first two articles wound up being 9 bullet points each. I decided to carry that theme through for no particular reason, and so I now have nine articles about getting ready for a marathon that all have a list of nine items. Technically, this round up of all of the articles also has 9 bullet points, since I am listing each one.

The articles are listed below in the order that they were published in. This is not necessarily the best order in terms of what to tackle in a chronological sense, but they are all worth looking at so I left them in their original order.

1. What to bring to the starting line
2. What to pack in your post-race bag
3. What to do the week before your race
4. What to do the morning of your race
5. What to do during your race
6. What to do after your race
7. What to do to stay safe
8. Marathon strategies
9. Choosing a marathon

Saving the best for last, and what probably should have been the first article, I would like to share a few of things to consider when you are choosing which marathon you want to run. This is not a comprehensive list, but just the first few questions that spring to mind when I start thinking about my next race.

The biggest consideration for myself is what time of year the race is in, and whether I will be able to afford to travel to it.

Here are 9 questions to ask yourself to help you choose your next marathon:
(Click here to continue reading…)

This evening is Halloween here in the States. As such, I decided that since drivers would be watching for kids on the side of the road that it would be a good night to run. Of course, I did not consider that there were more than twice as many drivers as usual.

All in all, it was a great run. I only had one kid yell “Run, Forrest, Run” at me. Usually, I hear that at least 2 or 3 times when I run by more than a few people. The weather was perfect, but I did run into a tree limb that is right at eye height. I did that last time I ran at night too. Most of the kids that I passed were amazed by somebody out running, and most of the older kids and young teenagers that were out couldn’t figure out what was coming at them until I was right on top of them.

I ran at a fairly good clip; definately faster than I needed to. I took off my long sleeve shirt, and was running in a short sleeve with a reflective vest and a head lamp. I highly recommend going out for a run tonight if the weather is as fair where you live as it is where I live.

Last week I wrote about how to prepare for, run, and recover from your marathon. This week I would like to write a few articles that focuses a little more upon decisions that you need to make about your marathon.

One decision that you need to make is what sort of strategy you are going to use to attack your race. Deciding how to run your race will determine how you train for your marathon. There is also the small matter of following your strategy and not adopting a different strategy on race day. You will find that your results will not always be what you expected when you train to run your marathon using one strategy but then change that strategy on race day.

So without further introduction, here are 9 ways to run a marathon:
(Click here to continue reading…)

In a collaborative effort with Scott over at Straight to the Bar, we wrote about rest for the month of October. This is the final article in our series. There will be a link to each topic at the bottom of this article.

The easiest way to time your rest is with a sports watch or stop watch. You can state before your workout how much rest that you want to allow yourself before starting your next set or repeat. This will allow you to accomplish various goals during your workout. The manner in which I time my rest depends greatly upon what type of workout that I am doing.
(Click here to continue reading…)

Halloween is right around the corner, and with it comes the halloween races. This weekend was the Great Pumpkin 10k in Saco and the Rolling Bones 5k in Bar Harbor.

The Great Pumpkin 10k had 212 finishers. Dirigo had 3 finishers in the top 5, including a win by Josh Zolla in 34:32. Marjorie Graff was 10^th overall to win the women’s race in 39:30. It was very windy on the course today.
(Full Results - Race Photos)

Rolling Bones was a much smaller but much faster race than the Great Pumpkin. Only 27 people finished the race. Steven Dewitt of Ellsworth won the race in under 5 minutes per mile pace with a time of 14:56. Dan Balaguero of Bangor was over a minute behind him to take second place in 16:14. It was warm but windy in the mid 40s.
(Full Results)

The Marine Corps Marathon was this morning. Ruben Garcia ran about a minute faster than last year, but it was not necessary to repeat his win. He beat Carl Rundell by over 3 minutes. Laura Thompson was unable to break 3 hours, but she won by about 2 minutes over Brenda Schrank. The top 5 women to finish were all American, as were the top 3 men.

The RIT alumni ran the race, finishing between just under 2 hours and 40 minutes up to just over 3 hours and 30 minutes. All four gentlemen ran their first marathon this morning. Congratulations go to Chad Byler, Bob McCoy, Jon Booth, and Ryan Pancoast. I have been unable to find team results yet from this year, so I am not sure how they did in the team competition. I hope that all four of them forget how much that race hurt so that I can race against them next year.

The New York City marathon is one week from today. That means that the Marine Corps Marathon was this morning. I have looked at the results already, but I am waiting for a more official version of them before sharing.

My last few weeks have been right around 30 miles, so I feel well tapered. My last non-really-short run before the marathon was run this morning in a galestorm, it seemed. Yesterday I got soaked to the bone in the torrential down pour and high winds. Today, I just got buffetted about by winds with even more force than yesterday. As an example of how windy it is today, I bring your attention to a tree across the river from my house. The tree is over 30 inches in diameter, and it is swaying back and forth pretty hard. That sort of wind presents its own sort of problems, but a lightly twisted ankle and only a 30 second drop in my per mile pace seemed to be the worst of it today.

For those who are running the marathon next week, or for those going to watch, you should get yourself a map from the transit authority. You can find out where anything of note is, as well as what stops to get off at to view the race at different locations. This could be very useful.

If anybody would like to get together before or after the race, you can email me here at Run to Win in the early half of this week.