Run, Karla, Run!

I’m not usually one to plug products or programs unless I’ve tried them myself, but my good friend and coach, Kevin Horty, is running a spring marathon and half-marathon training program with Terrier Tri in New York City. And while I can’t endorse Terrier Tri, I heartily endorse Coach Kevin. He’s the man with the plan who has seen me through over two dozen PR’s, including three consecutive marathon PR’s. As coach of the New York Harriers, he’s helped hundreds of other runners get faster too. And his marathon best of 2:41 ain’t too shabby.

The 14-week program begins on January 10, and includes three weekly group coached sessions in Central Park on Tuesday/Friday at 6 a.m. and Sunday at 8:30 a.m. Sessions include speed work, fartlek runs, hill workouts, tempo runs and fast finish long runs. The program also includes a weekly training schedule with five days per week of running and strength and core workouts, as well as online email support from Coach Horty and Coach Spencer Casey, head coach of the New York Athletic Club elite running team. Between them, these guys have 45 years of competitive running and coaching experience. The cost is $350 for Terrier Tri members and $395 for non-members. Check out the website for more information on the Bostonplus program.

And to everyone training for a spring marathon or half-marathon, start your engines!

With only four days until the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7, my excitement is ramping up exponentially. So I made a New York City mix—a love note to the city I adore, and love to run. These are my favorite songs about New York. There are lots of standards, some show tunes, rock songs, folk, rap and more. It seems everybody loves to sing about New York.

Happy listening, happy running, and when you’re facing the Queensboro Bridge at mile 15 of the marathon, just remember what Simon and Garfunkel sang in “The 59^th Street Bridge Song” (another name New Yorkers use for the Queensboro): “Life—I love you. All is Groovy!”

If you have a favorite New York City song, list it below! Read the rest of this entry →

Edison Peña, center, ran every day while trapped in the mine. Photo by Hugo Infante/Government of Chile.

Edison Peña, the rescued Chilean miner known as “The Runner,” will run the ING New York City Marathon on Nov. 7, Universal Sports reports.

New York Road Runners, which organizes the race, invited Peña to New York as their special guest after president and CEO Mary Wittenberg heard about his extraordinary efforts to stay fit and sane while trapped with 32 other men in a gold and copper mine near Copiapo, Chile. 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 →

Bernard Lagat celebrates his second place finish at the Continental Airlines Fifth Avenue Mile on Sept. 26, 2010. Photo by Phil Hospod.

How many times have you set a goal, only to come this close? How many times have you asked yourself “What if?”

Yup, that was me on Sunday at the Continental Airlines Fifth Avenue Mile. It’s easily my favorite race of the year. Running down Fifth Avenue in New York City as fast as you possibly can is a unique thrill. It’s about 20 city blocks straight down one of the most storied stretches of one of the most famous streets in the world. And then after running yourself, you get to watch some of the world’s fastest milers—Olympians and World Champions among them—duke it out.

One of those milers is Bernard Lagat. I’ve seen him race at the Fifth Avenue Mile a few times now, and I also witnessed his historic eighth win in the mile at the Millrose Games. He’s a four-time World Champion and he owns Olympic silver and bronze. He also taught me a very valuable lesson at Sunday’s race. Read the rest of this entry →

The High Line in New York City on Oct. 29. The elevated park is on the city's West Side. Photo by Rob Thurman/Flikr.

Okay, it’s been a full month since I ran the Chicago Marathon and I suppose it’s time—time to run again.

I’m a real stickler when it comes to the rules of training. And perhaps my favorite rule of training is actually the rule of recovery. A common adage says it takes one day per mile of any distanced raced for your body to fully recover. So that means I get 26.2 days off from hard training. I take that seriously. Maybe too seriously. As much as I love to run, I love to take it easy when I feel I’ve earned it.

But after about two and a half weeks of recovery, I started to get antsy. The yoga, stretching and sit-ups I was passing off for workouts just weren’t cutting it. So I finally laced up my shoes and hit the pavement. 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 →