2017 Chicago Marathon - 3:32:28

Posted on October 13, 2017 | 10 min read time

Chicago Marathon number three and my twelfth marathon overall! Let me just say off the bat, I have weird mixed feelings about this race. It’s hard to complain about a 3:32 finish and a BQ, but I’m not exactly thrilled with how I got there. But before I get into the race itself… Pre-race Danielle and I got to Chicago in the early afternoon on Thursday and, for the most part, I didn’t want to spend too much time on my feet, but Thursday and Friday ended up being bit more walking around than planned. [Read More]

A quick pre-Chicago Marathon training update

Posted on October 8, 2017 | 3 min read time

Since it’s sort of the last minute here and I’m planning to go to bed in an hour, I’m going to keep this short…at least for my standards. But I did want to throw up a quick little pre-race post regarding training. Going into my third Chicago Marathon and twelfth marathon total tomorrow, I can’t remember the last time I felt this out of running shape. It’s hard to describe, but I just feel slow and untrained. [Read More]

How did I run a nearly flawless race?

Posted on October 19, 2016 | 10 min read time

The me in this photo was expecting pretty much the opposite kind of race performance. It’s been a week and a half now since my nearly-flawless marathon in Chicago and I’m still trying to put together what I take away from this race. I’ve always been of the mindset that there’s much more to learn from failure than from success, but this race feels like the exception to the rule, for me. [Read More]

2016 Chicago Marathon - 3:28:41

Posted on October 11, 2016 | 20 min read time

Oh, yes, look at that smile! Marathon number nine is in the books! And it was fan-fucking-tastic! I would go so far as to describe this as not just my best marathon, but my best race ever. Pre-race The plan after getting to Chicago was to hit up the expo and then take it mostly easy though the rest of Friday and Saturday. I didn’t want to spend a lot of time on my feet. [Read More]

Chicago Marathon training recap

Posted on October 8, 2016 | 6 min read time

It’s marathon time. I guess. Well, not I guess, actually. It is marathon time. Tomorrow. Oof. For the most part, training went better than I had expected, but one part of marathoning that I’m really bad at is managing the nerves leading up to the race. I’ve be super stressed about it for the last two weeks. This is typical for me, but this time around it’s even worse. [Read More]

Halfway to Chicago Marathon - training check-in

Posted on August 15, 2016 | 5 min read time

Eight weeks down. Eight weeks to go. Training is flying by! It feels like I just started this training cycle, but here I am eight weeks in. That’s a good thing, it means things are going well and I’m not miserable or counting down the days until it’s over. I’m actually really enjoying it so far! If you recall back to eight weeks ago, I didn’t know what to expect from training. [Read More]

Marathon training, I guess

Posted on June 23, 2016 | 5 min read time

It’s been about five months since I had surgery and over a year since I last did a formal marathon training cycle. And it’s fifteen and a half weeks until Chicago Marathon. So, I guess, it’s time to start a new training cycle. Going into surgery, I had just run the Dopey Challenge and was crushing as many runs as I could fit into my schedule. [Read More]