While we are all experienced marathon runners enough that none of us need to be reminded of the importance of several longer runs to get ready for a marathon, I thought that, with the New York marathon exactly one month away, it would be helpfull to hear how some SLG'ers have attacked their long runs in the past few weeks.
Mike (the flyer) is no longer training for the New York Marathon. He decided to concentrate on a shorter distance and last Saturday, he ran the Fifth Avenue Mile in 5'45" and therefore did his "flyer" label proud.
As we could read in the blog, last month, Grant snuck into Central Park, all the way from L.A. to come and run a 20-miler incognito but he was caught in his endeavor by at least two other SLG'ers, also doing their long training run.
Dora has been training seriously. She reported a 2hour40 minutes training run last Thursday and is running races every weekend.
Stefan has a very interesting approach to his last long training runs. He flew to Germany, to get on a sailboat to sail to Sicily and do some serious hill training there. Seems like a complicated way to me to get in a long and hilly run, but Stefan has been known to do stuff like that in the past. I think it was only last year when he went for an 18 miler out of the Frankfurt airport when he was there for a layover.
Mark is training EXTREMELY secretively this year. There are signs that he is running in New York and that he does his long runs under the cover of darkness on Wednesday nights. Who knows what he has up his sleeve.
Gil and I did a 17 mile training run yesterday, on a very warm and summery October 6ht. 13.1 of these 17 miles were Grete's gallop, an official half marathon in the park. It was 71 degrees at the start and the humidity was 90%. Needles to say, the result wasn't pretty and I felt pretty much wiped out for the rest of the day.
But the guy who is doing the most amazing long run (except for super coach Clem maybe) is Philippe. He has been dropping hints that he is serious about retiring from marathon running after this season. (What about Berlin next year, what about Clem's invitational for his 100th??? Have you thought of that, Philippe???)
Anyway, because he claims that New York will be his last, he is pulling out all stops. He imported his parents from Belgium to Chicago, to come witness his long training run today, AS I AM TYPING, in 82 degrees Fahrenheit, with 60 percent humidity. His long run will be 26.2 miles, in these hot and humid conditions and is called THE CHICAGO MARATHON!!!!!!
I sincerely hope that you are almost finished (3 hours and 52 minutes since it started) and that it went well. I think you are crazy but I tip my hat to you nonetheless!!
P.S. good luck to Clem of course who is running the Brussels marathon next Sunday in preparation for New York!
P.P.S. With one month to go, I wish everybody a lot of stamina to keep up the training. I know I have the feeling that all I do is run, run, run but we are almost there. See you all on or before November 4th in New York
