Marathon time (Page 2)

Personally, I could really care less what people do.  At least you are out doing something.

My high school debaters (before I got involved with triathlon, I coached debate) would be quick to point out that the author's entire argument is a giant, gaping post hoc fallacy.  I'm not an historian or a running expert, but others have speculated that excellence in distance running, like any other sport, is largely genetic.  People of other ethnicities may in fact have a genetic makeup better suited for the task. The fact that Ryan Hall has never cracked the top 250 is completely insignificant to his argument unless several first generation American runners have.

Maybe I should quit playing pickup hoops, lest I accidentally throw off Spreewell's game.

Don't let ANYONE steal your joy. I watched the replay of IMLP this weekend and Bjorn Anderson had to walk the last few miles of the marathon, losing 1st - 18th place in  the process.  I guess he did not "run" his IM marathon either, but it takes a lot of guts to finish sometimes.     

You'll do ok.  Just seed yourself accordingly (not at the front).  Don't believe everything your read.   

Enjoy yourself on the run.  Smile and thank the volunteers.

John Bingham, a 5+ hour marathoner, tells a story about his conversation with an elite marathoner. He asks the fast guy what the longest run he's ever done, and the guy says something like 2.5 hours. And Bingham says in response, "you can only run for two-and-a-half hours? You suck!"

Slower runners definitely do not suck.

As long as you meet the following 2 criteria, you have EVERY right to be out there in the marathon field:

1.  You can finish in the race's posted time limit, be that 6, 8, or 20 hours.

2.  You join the right corrall, or if no corralls, seed yourself correctly based on the honor system.  

I'm a sub 3:30 marathoner (barely) and love the fact that there are people out racing with me, no matter what their pace.  The only time I will dislike a slower runner is when they are in corral 1 or 2 with me and I bump into them in the first mile because they're walking already.

Have fun, you always remember your first!

Illegitimi non carborundum 

Don't worry what other people think, whether you "ran" it or "walked" it or "crawled" it, for all I care...  I'm impressed that you are out there doing it.  THey have the same debate in IMs, if you didn't go sub 12, 13, 15, or whatever number is arbitrarily chosen, you didn't do an Ironman.  Or if you haven't raced Kona, you didn't do Ironman

Whatever.  It's the small person that diminishes the accomplishments of others.

Enjoy it and good luck!!!!!!!!

Ditto this...well said.

Enjoy yourself....

Trail_Runner

I think this is  where the meat of the article lies.  But it is all a matter of personal goals.  I for one would never enter a marathon (or any race) that I didn't feel like I could "race".  When people enter a race they are either racing to place first or racing themselves, with all but the fastest falling into the latter.  So if you are meeting your personal goals by walking a marathon, then so be it!  Only you will know if you've done your best and are proud of your accomplishments.  Hopefully one day you could reach the point where you can run the entire 26.2, and you'll feel another level of accomplishment.

I will say this, although unrelated, having running become a lot more popular has its downsides.  Like the White Rock Half Marathon in Dallas filling up already, and I was just about to register (was waiting to see if an injury would prevent me from signing up).

Just get out there and savor it. Certainly don't worry about any bad run you had in training. Now if you ask me there is no such thing as a bad run, just a run where you didn't feel as good as some other!

Hopefully you have good weather and a good crowd cheering you on

J

when I did my first tri, it was a very warm and fuzzy women's event with the emphasis on fun and participation.  As I was basking in the glory of having finished, a woman near me was complaining to her friend about the swimming leg and how some women actually resorted to breast-stroke and how disgusted she was that she had to compete with such losers.  It kind of took the shine of the day until I wondered what was wrong with her life that she had to demean the accomplishments of others to feel good.  

You will do fantastic in the race, the adrenalin will carry you through and there's nothing like a cheer squad to ease the pain.  Run, walk, skip or hop, YOU know what you've overcome and acheived and you will always have that joy.

Don't worry about a thing. Finishing a marathon, even walking the whole way, is a big deal. Of course, it's a bigger deal if you can jog/run the entire thing, and if you can race it, then, you're likely a very strong runner for your age group.

Train well, and get to that finish line on race day, even if you have to walk a lot of it. Nothing wrong with that, and there's no "ruining" anyone else's race. (Just don't start way out in front!)

Not really.  There needs to be some inherent physiological ability, but it more based on training methods, when they started and most importantly WHERE they are training.

Hall, the Kenyans, the Ethiopians, etc. are all training at altitude on hilly terrain.  THAT makes much more of a difference than ethnicity and genetics.

You can look at the VO2 max. of various top level runners over the years and see a fairly large disparity in "potential" based on them, yet those people often put up similar times ......

Okay, thanks.  This is where actual expertise would come in handy.  However, the point remains that the author's reasoning is fallacious and that there are other plausible explanations (geography, for example) for why the US no longer dominates the marathon field.

Agree with that.

The biggest reason in my opinion is actually money!  A good NCAA Div. 1 athlete can leave school, go to Europe and run with one of the elite track clubs, race every weekend or so and make a decent living off of it.

As a marathoner you have 2 possibly 3 races a year that you can peak for and be in the running for dough.  Blow one of those?  You are out of a paycheck.  And there is not a lot of wiggle room at the top where the money is on the line in bigger races (Boston, London, New York, Chicago, etc.) and the ones that offer big money bring out the big dogs which makes it even harder to place.

word. I guess I'm slow since I don't run at 5mph or faster....

As to your main concern, your speed makes no difference to the elites races. Not a factor at all.

I'll probably get bashed for this, but I have to wonder why you are doing a marathon when you clearly are not in shape to run most of it. Everyone has different motivations and measures success in their own way. It just seems like a more prudent course of action would be to train for and do races that you can actually run the entire distance, then build to increasingly longer races as your ability improves. It is very good you are running and taking your training seriously. This has been mentioned in other threads, but the long run may not be as important as overall volume when it comes to marathon training. You may be likely to have better success by running many weeks of 40+ miles as opposed to weeks of 30 miles that have a long run of 20 miles. It may be your lack of overall volume that made your recent long run so difficult.

I'm not criticizing what you are doing and I wish you the best of success.