Congratulations to all the runners in the Chicago Distance Classic! I was anchoring Sunday morning as 10,000 of you passed by the streetside studio at State and Lake. It was awesome. I was pretty envious though. What a great day to run! The Chicago Distance Classic is notoriously one of the hottest days of the year, but this year the weather Gods were smiling on John Bingham and his new partners from LaSalle Bank. The bank's involvement, along with making linking it to all the marathon training programs, helped more than double the size of the race.
ABC-7 and myself were associated with the CDC for years, when it was owned by the American Lung Association, and they struggled to get a couple thousand runners. But this year they had 10,000 and they seem to be on track to get many more next year. We interviewed my friend John Bingham on the air during the race, and I know he is pleased at how well it went. I'm curious to hear from everyone who ran, what they thought of the course.
As for the marathon training part of it, I know it is good to have race experience about now, and the half marathon is a good distance for it. Alot of the training programs have you going about that distance at this point anyway. I am kind of making up my training program as I go along at this point. I am building up the long runs. 18 this weekend, 20 in a couple weeks. During the week I am doing one longer run or Track workout, and going pretty easy the other days. I'm of the belief that the long runs are the most important part of being able to finish the marathon, and track workouts, hills, and tempo runs help you get there faster. I remember from college cross country how much work you could put in, and I'm definitely not anywhere near that. But I'm enjoying it, which in my opinion, is the most important factor. 
I want to put pictures on this blog to make it more interesting, so this is a picture from the finish of the Soldier Field 10 mile over Memorial day weekend. It's another fun race. But I really just put it in here because it's the only one I could find in my wife's file of pictures. Now if you want to see pictures of our kids......
Anyway, Jerry Taft wrote that he wanted to see more pictures of Alice Peacock. And since this is a blog about running, I can show her running. This is Alice after she finished running the Elvis is Alive 5k Saturday. She ran well, and then did a quick change and was on stage singing less than a half hour later with Buzz Kilman and Elvis impersonator Mark Hussman. Now that's impressive! You can see the picture of her dressed as Priscilla Presley on my first posting. 
So if there is anything you want to talk about, or see pictures of, just add your comment, and we'll see what we can do. I intend to include thoughts on marathon training from some of our area coaches in the next couple days. So if there is anything specific you are wondering, let me know. Keep running!
Comments