Before 2019, I would not consider myself a runner. Sure, I had run while playing other sports (e.g. soccer, basketball), but the running, while necessary, was more incidental. Fast forward to late-February 2019, after entering the NYC Marathon lottery 3-4x, I finally “won.” In the late winter/early spring, I slowly increased my running as I set out to read as much as I could about running a marathon generally and running the NYC Marathon in particular. Once I settled on a training program, I focused on getting myself in running shape in order to tackle some of the longer distances required in the first few weeks of the plan. As summer began, I also sought out opportunities to run with others and stumbled upon CHRC via social media. I had the good fortune of running with CHRC on several long runs during the course of the training season and sincerely enjoyed meeting members old and new and learning a bit about them and their running careers. With the exception of one long run on a particularly hot and muggy Friday evening through the East Village, the training itself was surprisingly enjoyable. As the training progressed and I felt more and more confident that I would be able to at least finish the marathon, I started thinking about more specific goals and how to accomplish them. Fortunately, with a few weeks left before the marathon, I was able to run the Staten Island half (thanks for the bib CHRC) with several CHRC members and it helped solidify some of my goals. At this point, I thought if I did my best, I might be able to finish the race under 4 hours, a time that months before seemed completely out of reach. Thanks in large part to the CHRC Saturday long runs and the CHRC NYC Marathon info session in late October, I arrived on Staten Island on November 3 feeling confident that I knew what I needed to do and how to get it done. By far, my favorite part of the run was running near my house, near mile 8-9 where I had all of my family waiting for me at mile 8 and then CHRC at mile 9. Four weeks after the marathon, I’m searching for my next run . . . and I’ll be training for it with CHRC.
If I could do the race all over again, I would do the following:
- Orient myself to the location of the starting corrals. I waited in the cold for 3 hours doing nothing and then sprinted to my corral and arrived just after it closed.
- Fuel better. I did not consume enough calories during each of my long training runs and on marathon day, I faded towards the very end due to insufficient fuel.
That being said, I would run it again in a heartbeat. Thank you CHRC for the support and community.