http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/sports/23marathon.html

rms

It seems there is always someone to churn the "runner vs. jogger"
fodder aka BS to include the Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/sports/23marathon.html

rms

On 10/25/2009 9:11 PM, rms wrote:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/sports/23marathon.html

rms



Interesting story, I ran my first marathon after about 3 months of
training 3 to 5 times a week, I did it in about 5 hours and when I
finished the marathon I was like "that's it?", but all along the course
I was being passed by what looked liked 80 year old geezers. After a few
hours when I thought about it, I felt kind of silly (and embarrassed
because of my "finish line sprint", i wish i could go back and slap
myself), felt like I was taking something away from the really old
people who were running at their full potential as well as the younger
folks who actually prepared properly and ran decent times under 3:30.
(In hindsight I think there is no excuse for someone 26 years old not to
run a marathon in the 3:30 to 4 hour range, but something inside me says
even that is a little gracious). aside from that what irritates me more
these days are the jackasses that run just as fast as casual runners,
and go out and write books about their experience and make a living from
their half assed efforts (because someone who makes a living at running
should be a good runner and train harder than a casual runner and
actually have some pride). of course that makes me a jackass for saying
that because i'm somehow taking something away from them.

despite my feelings about that, after my first marathon i quit my job to
run full time, but not to write a book or write ten page blog posts
about my 1 hour 10k, but to become a runner that actually wins races.
but okay so what says the offended plodder with their nice warm brightly
colored outfits and latest high tech shoes and new hair plugs and fake
tits, good for you champ, glad you can take 10 years off to train, i
would too if i could. but i'm like seriously if you love running that
much maybe you can't take 10 years off to run because you have a family
or kids, that's fine, but if you love running so much and you invest all
this money in the finest linens and shoes at least run a 5k faster then
your grandmother. because if you can't do that excusing those who are
missing limbs or are physically or mentally disabled, why are you
running? to one up the fat ass sitting next to you... purely vein in my
opinion are these folks, but you can't tell them that because they will
respond in so many words, why you haten' fool.

so your a runner that wants to stay in shape, good i'm glad you found
the motivation to wipe the potato chip crumbs off your chest, but that
doesn't mean you need to go out and run a marathon (says the guy who did
the exact same thing), as if running a marathon in 7 hours puts you at
the pinnacle of fitness. but if you want to run a marathon just to say
you did it, do it during a training run, and instead of buying 2 pairs
of 100 dollar shoes to rotate and 500 dollars of running gear, buy a
garmin just so you can prove to your friends and to yourself that you
did it.

the thing is after doing my marathon i realized "anybody" can complete
the distance (there's nothing magical that happens after running 12
minute splits for 26 miles, you don't turn into a frog and you don't
turn into a prince), and at that point i realized i took something away
from the whole concept of the thing and turned it into more of a weekend
at the bar with friends, a social occasion, there are certainly more
appropriate places to have a social get together then a marathon, like a
nice jog with friends for instance.

so after i did my marathon all of the sudden my wife wanted to do the
same thing, after some convincing i told her to just run the thing as a
training run, and to my astonishment after see did it she felt just as
"good" as i did after completing it, and you know what, she did without
people around her, and she did it without aid stations and portable
crappers, she did it for herself. that's something that speaks for itself.

and after she did it, she stopped running 5 times a week and now just
rides her bike to pace me during long runs and the rest of the week she
goes to her cardio kickboxing classes, lol, because that's what she
loves to do for exercise.

so if running is what you love to do for exercise, do it, but races are
for runners, not casual joggers with no desire to truly compete with
their age group.

*sets garbage can on fire*

cheers, and for all you real runners out there, train hard. eddie

On 10/29/2009 5:59 AM, Edward Edmonds wrote:

2 more cents: on calling yourself a marathoner, it's like if your a
casual jogger and you call yourself an athlete, we all have an idea of
what an athlete is, but if everybody started calling themselves an
athlete just because they exercised a bit, being an athlete would lose
it's meaning. just like training, i dislike when people say i'm training
for a marathon only to run it in 6 hours, it's misleading, no your not,
your not training, your getting in shape to run 26 miles, an athlete
trains, a jogger exercises.

*full of opinions*

On Oct 29, 2:22 am, Edward Edmonds<edward.edmo... at (no spam) gmail.com> wrote:
On 10/29/2009 5:59 AM, Edward Edmonds wrote:

2 more cents: on calling yourself a marathoner, it's like if your a
casual jogger and you call yourself an athlete, we all have an idea of
what an athlete is, but if everybody started calling themselves an
athlete just because they exercised a bit, being an athlete would lose
it's meaning. just like training, i dislike when people say i'm training
for a marathon only to run it in 6 hours, it's misleading, no your not,
your not training, your getting in shape to run 26 miles, an athlete
trains, a jogger exercises.

*full of opinions*

Eddie boy, as we like to say opinions are like excretion organs,
everybody has a few and your brown door is showing. We have been up
and down this topic so many times that all you will generate is a yawn
some unflattering labels but mostly silence.

Take the time you used to post these childish labeling notions and try
to get some overweight friend off the couch to run a 7 hours marathon
and maybe save his life. if he does from the couch to 7 hours he/she
is one hell of and athlete.

-D

On 10/29/2009 12:41 PM, pithydoug wrote:



On Oct 29, 2:22 am, Edward Edmonds<edward.edmo... at (no spam) gmail.com>  wrote:
On 10/29/2009 5:59 AM, Edward Edmonds wrote:

2 more cents: on calling yourself a marathoner, it's like if your a
casual jogger and you call yourself an athlete, we all have an idea of
what an athlete is, but if everybody started calling themselves an
athlete just because they exercised a bit, being an athlete would lose
it's meaning. just like training, i dislike when people say i'm training
for a marathon only to run it in 6 hours, it's misleading, no your not,
your not training, your getting in shape to run 26 miles, an athlete
trains, a jogger exercises.

*full of opinions*

Eddie boy, as we like to say opinions are like excretion organs,
everybody has a few and your brown door is showing. We have been up
and down this topic so many times that all you will generate is a yawn
some unflattering labels but mostly silence.

Take the time you used to post these childish labeling notions and try
to get some overweight friend off the couch to run a 7 hours marathon
and maybe save his life. if he does from the couch to 7 hours he/she
is one hell of and athlete.

-D

i know -D. to put the proverbial toe in mouth, i never had a chance to
"participate" in such a discussion, so i had to flip over and get the
brown stuff of my chest. lol.

Interesting story, I ran my first marathon after about 3 months of
training 3 to 5 times a week, I did it in about 5 hours and when I
finished the marathon I was like "that's it?", but all along the course
I was being passed by what looked liked 80 year old geezers.  After a
few hours when I thought about it, I felt kind of silly (and embarrassed
because of my "finish line sprint", i wish i could go back and slap
myself), felt like I was taking something away from the really old
people who were running at their full potential as well as the younger
folks who actually prepared properly and ran decent times under 3:30.
(In hindsight I think there is no excuse for someone 26 years old not to
run a marathon in the 3:30 to 4 hour range, but something inside me says
even that is a little gracious). aside from that what irritates me more
these days are the jackasses that run just as fast as casual runners,
and go out and write books about their experience and make a living from
their half assed efforts (because someone who makes a living at running
should be a good runner and train harder than a casual runner and
actually have some pride). of course that makes me a jackass for saying
that because i'm somehow taking something away from them.

despite my feelings about that, after my first marathon i quit my job to
run full time, but not to write a book or write ten page blog posts
about my 1 hour 10k, but to become a runner that actually wins races.
but okay so what says the offended plodder with their nice warm brightly
colored outfits and latest high tech shoes and new hair plugs and fake
tits, good for you champ, glad you can take 10 years off to train, i
would too if i could. but i'm like seriously if you love running that
much maybe you can't take 10 years off to run because you have a family
or kids, that's fine, but if you love running so much and you invest all
this money in the finest linens and shoes at least run a 5k faster then
your grandmother. because if you can't do that excusing those who are
missing limbs or are physically or mentally disabled, why are you
running? to one up the fat ass sitting next to you... purely vein in my
opinion are these folks, but you can't tell them that because they will
respond in so many words, why you haten' fool.

so your a runner that wants to stay in shape, good i'm glad you found
the motivation to wipe the potato chip crumbs off your chest, but that
doesn't mean you need to go out and run a marathon (says the guy who did
the exact same thing), as if running a marathon in 7 hours puts you at
the pinnacle of fitness. but if you want to run a marathon just to say
you did it, do it during a training run, and instead of buying 2 pairs
of 100 dollar shoes to rotate and 500 dollars of running gear, buy a
garmin just so you can prove to your friends and to yourself that you
did it.

the thing is after doing my marathon i realized "anybody" can complete
the distance (there's nothing magical that happens after running 12
minute splits for 26 miles, you don't turn into a frog and you don't
turn into a prince), and at that point i realized i took something away
from the whole concept of the thing and turned it into more of a weekend
at the bar with friends, a social occasion, there are certainly more
appropriate places to have a social get together then a marathon, like a
nice jog with friends for instance.

so after i did my marathon all of the sudden my wife wanted to do the
same thing, after some convincing i told her to just run the thing as a
training run, and to my astonishment after see did it she felt just as
"good" as i did after completing it, and you know what, she did without
people around her, and she did it without aid stations and portable
crappers, she did it for herself. that's something that speaks for itself..

and after she did it, she stopped running 5 times a week and now just
rides her bike to pace me during long runs and the rest of the week she
goes to her cardio kickboxing classes, lol, because that's what she
loves to do for exercise.

so if running is what you love to do for exercise, do it, but races are
for runners, not casual joggers with no desire to truly compete with
their age group.

*sets garbage can on fire*

cheers, and for all you real runners out there, train hard. eddie

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/sports/23marathon.html

rms

On Sun, 25 Oct 2009 14:11:20 -0600, rms wrote:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/sports/23marathon.html

rms

I've walked a marathon. My experience is this:

1. As I progressed through the course the water stations seemed to be
getting less frequent but there was still a consistent frequency of areas
where empty bottles were scattered across the road suggesting that they
packed up a lot of the stations once the runners went by.

2. The toilets also became infrequent forcing me to use the toilets in a
McDonalds instead.

3. The police don't want to keep the roads closed for stragglers and
eventually asked the walkers to use the pavement. The rest of the course
involved navigating around pedestrians and using pedestrian crossings
when I reached traffic lights.