Run, Karla, Run!

The Walt Disney World Marathon (Photo: Marathon Foto)

Last week marked the sixth anniversary of my very first race back in 2007. Last fall, I chronicled how I went from a person who loathed running to someone who loves it. How much do I love it? Over these last six years, I’ve run 53 races with number 54, the UnitedHealthcare Providence Half Marathon, in one week and numbers 55, 56 and 57 already on the books.

Looking back at six years of racing, it occurred to me that certain races have a special place in my heart. Every runner has that race they look forward to every year, the race they’ve always dreamed of running, the race that moved them in unexpected ways. These are mine.

So without further ado, here are my “Races to Remember,” the running races that left the biggest impressions on me, culled from my six years out there on the road.

Races To Remember Read the rest of this entry →

Ready to shave 1 hour from my marathon time.

In just a few days, I’ll be staring at the starting line of the Walt Disney World Marathon on January 13, 2013. It will be my sixth marathon and the first I’m not running for a personal best. This one is just for fun, and I don’t care how long it takes me. I’m going to wear a costume, take pictures with Disney characters and enjoy a course that runs through four theme parks, a race track and a baseball diamond.

To honor the occasion, I thought I’d take a look back at my second marathon, which was the exact opposite. At the 2008 ING New York City Marathon, I set out to shatter my one and only marathon time—clocked on the same course just a year before—by an hour.

This race report was first published on TheSportsBank.net in November 2008, but I thought I’d finally put it up here at RunKarlaRun.com too. After all, it was my first true marathon PR.

I also happen to be in an ’80s cover band called The Fades. This month marks the 5th anniversary of our first show. We’re all—save one—marathoners. In fact, I’m the slowest of the bunch. This post was inspired by them. Rock on, Fades!

Marathon Redux, ’80s Music Edition

I did it. I ran the ING New York City Marathon. Again. And by ran, I mean ran. The whole blessed thing. Who knew all it would take was zealous devotion to a few ‘80s songs? Read the rest of this entry →

One Team Hope For The Warriors runner finishes her marathon.

Scroll down for a slideshow of the unofficial marathon in Central Park.

Some called it the unofficial New York City marathon, some called it the Run Anyway marathon. But no matter what they called it, thousands of runners spontaneously took to Central Park on what would have been Marathon Sunday, November 4 in New York City.

In the wake of the canceled 2012 ING New York City Marathon, many runners tried to make the best of a terrible situation. In addition to running, thousands of marathoners volunteered on Saturday and Sunday in some of the city’s hardest hit areas. An estimated 1,300 alone went to Staten Island on Sunday to drop supplies and help residents clean up. Others helped out in Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood, the Rockaways in Queens, Newark in New Jersey and parks all over the city.

Thousands of other runners took to Central Park, dropping donations for hurricane relief near the “official” finish line and running a flash mob of sorts. It was like a scene out of “How The Grinch Stole Christmas.” The Whos of Whoville didn’t need the trappings of Christmas. It seems, neither do marathoners. Read the rest of this entry →

Enjoying the Yonkers waterfront.

Yonkers Marathon & Half Marathon History

Located directly north of New York City on the Hudson River, Yonkers is one of those not-so-small “small towns” with nearly 200,000 residents. It’s not exactly Mayberry, but compared to the monster that is NYC, it’s a hamlet. Much the same thing can be said about the Yonkers Marathon & Half-Marathon. With just 1,000 registrants for both races combined, it truly has the feel of a hometown race, unlike the behemoth that is the ING New York City Marathon.

The Yonkers Marathon has a storied history as the second-oldest marathon in the country behind Boston. Read the rest of this entry →

New York City's Statue of Liberty. (Photo: Phil Hospod)

A bib in the ING New York City Marathon is one of the toughest gets in the world of running. Roughly 140,000 runners apply to earn one of the coveted 47,500 entries. Year after year, runners all over the world are turned away.

Well, here’s one more chance. Nissan is giving away one more “golden” entry into the 2012 race, along with a free trip to the Big Apple, through its Innovation for Endurance program, which highlights elite athletes like Olympic and New York City Marathoner Ryan Hall.

From July 22 through July 28, enter for your chance to win entry into the 2012 ING New York City Marathon along with roundtrip airfare to New York City, hotel accommodations, an official training program, airport transportation, weekend transportation in a Nissan vehicle including transportation to the starting line in Staten Island, a Saturday shake-out run with a Nissan athlete and VIP tickets to the pre-race pasta party and post-race celebration.

Enter the Nissan Innovation for Endurance Golden Entry Sweepstakes at facebook.com/InnovationForEndurance through 11:59 p.m. ET on July 28.

Karla Bruning is a veteran journalist and running nerd. She has completed four marathons, two triathlons, trains with the New York Harriers and is a member of New York Road Runners. Follow Karla’s “Notes From a Running Nerd” at RunKarlaRun.com, Facebook and Twitter@KBruning.

The 2011 Foot Locker Five Borough Challengers (Photo: nycmarathon.org)

Are you running the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 4? Do you live in one of New York City’s five boroughs? You could be a part of the Foot Locker Five Borough Challenge, a race within a race at the ING New York City Marathon.

Five runners—one from each of New York City’s boroughs of the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island—run together for the first half of the race, and then face off against each other in the second.

This year, Foot Locker is looking for team members who have used running to overcome significant challenges in their lives. Read the rest of this entry →

Disney’s Princess Half Marathon was a fairy tale race.

If you keep on believing, the dreams that you wish will come true. Cinderella sang those words and I took them to heart. At Disney’s Princess Half Marathon in Walt Disney World in Florida, I channeled my inner Cinderella and believed that I could break my half-marathon personal record (PR). Disney races aren’t for PR’s many people say. Just have fun, they tell you. But on Sunday, Feb. 26, I learned that it’s possible to PR and have fun too.

Running in Costume: Cinderella and Prince Charming

For starters, I feel compelled to confess: I ran in costume. Not just that, I cajoled my fiancé, Phil, to run in costume with me—as Cinderella and Prince Charming. Cinderella has long been my favorite princess, ever since I saw clips of the film on my Fisher Price Movie Viewer Theater back in the early 1980s. I even named my dog Cinderella. What better character to summon for a half-marathon than a gal who knows how to put her head down and work hard?

I found that once you put on a costume and give in to the Disney spirit, it’s inevitable that you’re going to have a good time, no matter how painful the running itself may be. Read the rest of this entry →

Letting kids race teaches them that fitness is fun. (Photo: runDisney)

When Disney puts on a race, they don’t just plan one running event. As the world’s largest media empire—Disney sits at No. 1 on the Fortune 500 list of entertainment companies—they orchestrate an entire weekend of festivities that everyone in the family can enjoy, from first-time runners to marathon masters, kids to adults, and even spectators. That’s one of the best parts of Disney race weekends: there is something for everyone.

At Disney’s Princess Half Marathon Weekend from Feb. 24-26, my family is putting the Disney races to the test. At least one family member will be participating in every race distance offered during the weekend, including the Princess Half Marathon, Tangled Royal Family 5K and Disney Royal Family Kids’ Races. We’ll also hit the Pasta in the Park Party at Epcot and Disney’s Fit for a Princess Expo. This is my third Disney race weekend, but the first with my nephew and niece. It makes me happy to pass along my love of running to another generation. But more than that, I think it’s important to include kids in fitness events from an early age. Read the rest of this entry →

The author and her soon-to-be-fiance after the Disney Wine & Dine Half Marathon. He proposed just a few moments later.

I met this guy. After chatting a while, he mentioned that he was registered to run the ING New York City Marathon. He’d never run a marathon before. Heck, he’d never been on a single run, he said. He belonged to an Ultimate Disc league, a sport that requires a lot of running. But he was no runner. His sister had talked him into it, he said. The race was nine months away and he had no idea how to train for it.

As luck would have it, I was a runner. I ran the New York City Marathon just three months before, and was registered to run it again as well. So I offered to show him the ropes of marathon training, and take him on his very first run.

It was an unseasonably warm February day. We headed out to Central Park, where we’d met for a casual walk just a week before. We ran up to Belvedere Castle overlooking Turtle Pond and the Great Lawn, then jogged through the Ramble and back to the southern entrance to the park. He’d never visited those parts of Central Park before, he said. Stick with me, I said. As a runner, you see a lot of things you don’t notice otherwise.

Well, he stuck with me. Four years later, that guy is my fiancé, and running has played a large part in our courtship. Read the rest of this entry →

Runners in Brooklyn's Prospoect Park. Photo by Karla Bruning.

Brooklyn is toeing the line. The inaugural Brooklyn Marathon kicks off on Sunday, Nov. 20 at 8 a.m. in Prospect Park. In the tradition of New York City marathons, this one has humble roots. The race is capped at 350 runners and the course is contained entirely in Prospect Park, the crown jewel of the borough’s park system. But founder Steve Lastoe hopes it’s just the beginning for this fledgling race.

“I want a race that’s organically part of Brooklyn,” Lastoe said on The New York Running Show, a podcast where I’m, at times, a panelist. “I want this race to be loved by Brooklyn.”

New York City could certainly use another marathon. The ING New York City marathon, the largest in the world, had more than 148,000 applicants for its 45,000 spots in the 2011 race. The demand amongst runners is plentiful, but the supply isn’t. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo courtesy of New York Road Runners.

The ING New York City Marathon on Sunday, Nov. 6 gave us two truly exciting races in both the men’s and women’s competitions. Three runners shattered—and I mean shattered—the course record in the men’s competition. And one runner gave a guts-on-the-floor performance that likely cost her the race in the women’s competition. Scroll down for athlete interviews, stats and more as I was ringside in the Timex Media Center at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Columbus Circle, giving a behind the scenes play-by-play of what it’s like in the press room as a New York Road Runners Social Media Reporter. Here’s how it went:

2011 ING New York City Marathon Live Blog

8:30 am: Good morning! I’m here in the Timex Media Center at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in New York City. We are one minute away from the wheelchair start of the 2011 ING New York City Marathon! Read the rest of this entry →

The start of the ING New York City Marathon. Photo by Fergal Carr.

For the first time since 2007, I’m not running a marathon. It feels a little odd, especially as the ING New York City Marathon approaches on Sunday, Nov. 6. I’ve run the race three times—each to a personal best. When I ran Chicago instead in 2009, I was out on the course cheering for my friends who were running the Big Apple.

Not one to idly let the marathon pass me by, I’ll still be participating in another way this year. New York Road Runners recruited me to be one of their Social Media Reporters. I’m teaming up with NYRR TV’s The Daily Cool Down hosted by Olympian Carrie Tollefson—a daily recap show of all the hustle and bustle surrounding marathon week—on Friday night and Saturday, tweeting as they run around the city capturing the excitement of marathon weekend. Then on race day, I’ll be blogging live from the marathon media center, sharing what’s really going on behind the scenes of the world’s biggest marathon. Read the rest of this entry →

Emmanuel Mutai won the 2011 London Marathon with a new course record. Photo by EStepnist/FLickr.

The ING New York City Marathon is the world’s biggest marathon. It’s no wonder the race attracts some of the world’s biggest names in running. Emmanuel Mutai, Martin Lel, and Jaouad Gharib will join defending champion Gebre Gebremariam and 2009 champion Meb Keflezighi in the race on November 6.

Kenya’s Lel, 33, won the ING New York City Marathon in 2003 and 2007, and will be returning to the race for the first time since that 2007 victory. He also won the Virgin London Marathon in 2003, 2007 and 2008, and placed fifth at the 2008 Olympics. After battling two years of injuries he came back with a second place finish in the 2011 Virgin London Marathon in April, losing to none other than Emmanuel Mutai. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo by Phil Hospod

On June 3, 1972, 78 women entered the world’s first ladies-only road race. On June 9, 2007, I ran the race as my very first 10K, along with 3,521 other women. Only four years later, the race has reached capacity around 5,000 runners—all of them pavement-pounding women. Tomorrow is the 40th running of the NYRR New York Mini 10K. I’ll be there to sing the national anthem, run the race and celebrate how far women—myself included—have come in our sport.

The Mini

The original Mini, named after the mini-skirt, was staged at a time when women were just starting to break gender barriers in running and sports at large. 1972 was a landmark year for women’s running. Read the rest of this entry →