Run, Karla, Run!

Photo by Phil W. Shirley

12 weeks down, 4 to go.

The ancient Greeks gave us a lot: the Hippocratic oath, democracy, the Olympics, and, of course, marathons. Race organizers around the world are celebrating the 2500th anniversary of the battle of Marathon this year (never mind the fact that it should be 2011).

But the ancient Greeks also gave us something else: the journey to hell and back. Reading Greek mythology, it seems like people were always trekking to the underworld for one reason or another; Odysseus, Hercules and, most famously, Orpheus all made the trip.

The joke that the distance to hell and back is 26.2 miles is apt. And like Orpheus ascending from the underworld, there’s no looking back.

The road to the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7 hasn’t been much different, marked by highs, lows, good news and bad news. The agony and the ecstasy are part of the journey. And my last two weeks of training have been filled with agony and ecstasy. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo by fotologic/Flikr

10 weeks down, six to go.

Believe. It’s a loaded word. One that is used and abused in popular culture, in religion, in politics, in all the areas of life where what we want to be true may not always be, and what is true is not always pretty. As humans, we have a unique ability to delude ourselves. And yet, we continue to believe any number of things for any number of reasons, some of which are worth believing.

Running isn’t any different. Every runner has a different set of beliefs: that stretching is good or bad, that running with headphones is helpful or a hindrance, that tackling an ultramarathon is sane or insane, that we’ll actually be able to achieve our running goals.

I began to question my beliefs during my last week of training for the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo by Christy Hourihan

Nine weeks down, seven to go.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Training for a marathon is like riding a roller coaster. After the high of scoring a personal record at the OASIS Montreal Half-Marathon, I was due for a little deflation. You can’t sit on top of the roller coaster forever. At some point, it’s going to roll down.

And roll down it did. The last two weeks of training for the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7 have been full of shenanigans that forced many a change of plans. In the process, I learned the power of saying yes and no. Read the rest of this entry →

Running a tune-up race is a great way to prep for a marathon. Photo by Sergis blog.

Seven weeks down, nine to go.

Training for a marathon is long process. Much like my training for the 2010 ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7, most runners spend at least 16 weeks, or the better part of four months, agonizing over every detail—longs runs, speed workouts, tempo runs, strength training, cross training, stretching, nutrition, sleep, avoiding injuries, avoiding illness, you name it, all for a few hours of agonizing glory. As the old U.S. Marine Corps adage goes—which my boyfriend and fellow marathoner-in-crime loves to quote—“Pain is weakness leaving the body.”

While all that weakness is busy leaving our bodies, we’re hoping that what we’re doing actually works. That come race day, we’ll be in our best shape to conquer 26.2 miles. All that pain better mean some gain.

But how do you know if your training is serving you well? There’s nothing like a big tune-up race to check in with your training. Running a race before your big marathon gives you an intermediary goal to work toward, and will let you know if your training is working, what marathon goals you should be targeting and what potential race-day problems might pop up. Read the rest of this entry →

Photo by Marzanna Syncerz © PhotoXpress.com

BRISTOL, R.I. — Six weeks down, 10 to go.

Today’s column is brought to you by the letter ‘P’ and the letter ‘R.’

I earned a pair of them on Sunday. It was a fantastic week of training for the 2010 ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7; a week that reminded me what it feels like to be a kid on summer vacation, and made me grateful for all the running I’ve enjoyed.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love vacation. Who doesn’t? I love to travel and explore—as I child I used to pretend I was like Bert and Ernie searching the vast African jungle for Dr. Livingstone.

But my vacation this week felt a bit more like summer vacations of yore—running around the neighborhood, buying ice cream, hitting the pool, watching movies at night, and generally killing time in the most pleasing ways imaginable; basically, by doing a whole lot of nothing.

But remember what the end of summer felt like as a kid? A new school year is quickly approaching, and you know you have to make every single day count. You’ve got to run and play and swim hard. Because before you know it, you’ll be sitting in a stiflingly hot classroom staring out the window at a sunny patch of grass, remembering better times. And I was a kid who actually liked school. But I still liked unfettered summertime better.

Running a race in Rhode Island reminded me of those old summertime days. It was in fact a sunny day that swept all the clouds away. The air was sweet, the sky was an unbroken streak of blue, and not even a temperature of 80 degrees could slow me down. Read the rest of this entry →

The Montreal Half-Marathon starts with a 5.5 mile uphill climb. Photo of Montreal by Christine Scholes.

Five weeks down, 11 to go…

With another solid, feel-good week of training for the 2010 ING New York City Marathon under my belt, I’ve decided to look forward to the week ahead. Namely, I’m looking forward to my big pre-marathon litmus test—the OASIS Montreal Half-Marathon on Sept. 5.

It’s going to be an uphill battle—literally. When I looked at the elevation chart, I gulped. How could I possibly prepare for this race when uphill climbs are my Kryptonite, my public enemy number one, my Newman? Read the rest of this entry →

Check out The Marathon Show for an interview with Karla. She talks about the running status of many elite marathoners, how to be a successful blogger, her coverage of the Olympics and much more.

The author.

Two weeks down, 14 to go…

Well, just two weeks into my training for the 2010 ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7, I’ve already done it—I missed a long run.

It couldn’t be helped. I came down with a fever and chills that knocked me out of the game for a few days.

The funny thing is, I wasn’t actually planning on doing the 10-mile run on my schedule. I was camping in the Adirondack Mountains, and after two days of canoeing, I had on the docket a 26-mile hike with a total of 10,000 feet of elevation gain. I figured that would be far more taxing on my legs and lungs than any long run, so I could easily just swap it out, a bit overzealously, but swap it out nonetheless. I figured that starting my marathon training by hiking one first would be kind of poetic.

Alas, it wasn’t to be. Read the rest of this entry →

New York, New York. Photo by Fergal Carr.

Cue the theme from Rocky: “Gonna fly now…. Getting strong now…” Yee-haw. Marathon season is here. This week marks the start of training for the 2010 ING New York City Marathon. Come Nov. 7, I’ll be strong and ready to fly.

Or will I?

This past weekend, I took a sailing class out in New York Harbor. We sailed from lower Manhattan past the Statue of Liberty to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, the iconic start of the race. It was a view of the bridge I’ve never seen before. As the boat cruised underneath, I looked up at the mass of steel and bolts looming above me. My blood rushed. In just 16 weeks I would be crossing that bridge at the start of the New York City Marathon.

I looked back up the bay toward Manhattan. The island was tiny in the distance, seemingly a word away. I gulped. Read the rest of this entry →

It seems like everyone wants to run the marathon. And not just any marathon—the ING New York City Marathon. Haile Gebrselassie, the marathon world record holder and undisputed King of the Road, has already announced that he’s running NYC for the first time this fall. Defending NYC champion and American superstar Meb Keflezighi is also returning to defend his title. And now, Shalane Flanagan, America’s track darling, has announced she’ll be making her marathon debut in New York on November 7.

“It’s the ultimate challenge for the distance runner,’’ Flanagan told The Boston Globe. “I would love to win another Olympic medal, but more than anything, I would love to win a major marathon.’’ Read the rest of this entry →

Meb Keflezighi chases down Kenya’s Robert Cheruiyot at the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 1. Photo by Randy Lemoine.

It only took 27 years. For the first time since Alberto Salazar ran away with the title in 1982, an American won the ING New York City Marathon. On Sunday, Nov. 1, Meb Keflezighi cruised to victory in 2:09:15 wearing a “U.S.A.” singlet. Does his win signal the return of the great American marathoner?

Back in the 1970s and early 1980s, marathon legends Frank Shorter, Bill Rodgers, Joan Benoit Samuelson and Salazar enjoyed an era when Americans actually won races, and inspired a generation of runners to hit the pavement in the process—running boom, anyone? Indeed, Rodgers has the most major marathon wins—8 of them—of any runner in history according to the World Marathon Majors, a two-year race series with a $1 million prize. (New York, Boston, Chicago, London and Berlin comprise the Majors, along with the Olympics and World Championships as qualifying races.) But African runners have largely dominated the sport since. Sure, an American star like Deena Kastor—who won Chicago in 2005 and London in 2006—has challenged the status quo every now and then. But on the world’s streets at large, the U.S. hasn’t been a factor. Certainly not like Kenya or Ethiopia. But this year on the mean streets of New York, a total of six American men finished in the top 10—the most since 1979—with Keflezighi taking the crown. All signs point to a potential renaissance. Read the rest of this entry →

Natalie stops to chat with her cheerleaders. Photo by Christy Hourihan.

I was running. Striding up Second Avenue in my new sneakers hurrying to catch my friend who was also running. But she was racing the ING New York City Marathon, and I was merely a spectator hoping to spot her at Mile 17.

If you’ve ever run a marathon, you know how critical spectators can be. I’ve been lucky enough to run three with friends and family peppered throughout the course, lighthouses on a stormy day blinking me in. Last year in the New York City Marathon, the devil on my shoulder was whispering insidious thoughts about quitting the race as I climbed the steep incline of the Queensboro Bridge around Mile 16. But knowing I had friends at Mile 17, Mile 18, Mile 20 and on kept me going. For one thing, I have just enough vanity to not want to look bad lollygagging up to them when I should be running. But I also know that seeing them is usually all the encouragement I need.

This year, I was excited for my first marathon as a spectator. My friend Natalie, one of my diehard cheerleaders, was running her first marathon. She was nervous and I was happy to be the one rooting her on for a change. Read the rest of this entry →