New York City Marathon!

I am very happy to announce that I will be making my return to the marathon on November 7th at the ING New York City Marathon. After taking the last year and a half away from the marathon and concentrating on shorter distance races, I am very excited to get back to my passion–the 26.2.  When I first tried the marathon in 2006, I thought running 4:55 per mile didn’t sound that hard. I’ve struggled a bit in the four marathons I have run and I was disappointed with how I finished.  Making the change and coming to Portland to work with Alberto has really energized me and I have drastically improved in the 5K, 10K, and half marathon, and hopefully I can continue to improve that same amount in the marathon.  I went from a 13:16, 27:35, 61:25 guy to 12:56, 27:22 (in a hard World Championships), 60:00.  Even though New York is probably the slowest Major Marathon, I know I will have to be much better than the 2:10 PR I have in the marathon.  I will have to be a 2:05-06 guy to have a shot a winning NYC, but I am very confident that I can be there and will have a successful return and keep that momentum going.  Now that I am getting to the best years of my career I am ready to tackle this challenge again and see just how good I can be. This time, however, I wont be as arrogant as the first time I tried because the marathon can humble you–but I have certainly learned that lesson already.