It all started with a gift to my Grandpa.

This:
http://canoegalholly.blogspot.com/

is the blog that I did when I did my first marathon.  You can get the whole gist of it there if you like.  OR I can just fill you in on the details.

My father died in 2007, towards the end of that year I got a bug in my head that I could do a marathon, (more on that later, as in all the time) so on Thanksgiving day, after I did my frequent "run around the lake" in my hometown of Cuba NY, I decided that for Christmas I would give my Grandpa a gift certificate to a "Wineglass Marathon Weekend" where I was going to run my first marathon.

I trained...fairly well...ok not really well at all when it comes down to it. But did very respectable. 3:26.

I was happy with that for...oh, 24 hours.

Then, I thought...I could do better.

The following year I ran Wineglass again, and blew up at mile 20, finishing in 3:35 after mostly walking the last 10k, then, full of the thought of redemption, signed up for the Harrisburg marathon.  Did one session of speed work (noteably my first speed work ever) and Ran a 3:22 at Harrisburg.

Decided to give Boston a go, paid a real coach to coach me, and pulled off a 3:15 from Hopkinton to Boston.

I returned to Boston again the following year and blew up at around mile 13.  Thats a long way to go with no energy.

The following year, I trained for the Shamrock marathon, and had a disappointing race, finishing in 3:27 after having a bad 8 miles, then signed up for the Gansett Marathon in RI, having a flawless first 20 miles, right on pace for a sub 3:10, only to fall apart and finish in 3:18 - however I'll take it.  Because there is one thing that is very important in all of this.

I am, or at least have been, first and foremost a canoe racer.  I race around 15 marathon canoe races a year, ranging in length from 2 hours to 16 hours.  Needless to say, you use different muscles for both of these sports.

But now, I'm considering taking a year (or two) (INCONCEIVABLE) off of canoe racing, to see how far I can go in this running world.

Far is not to be taken literally, I have absolutely NO desire to run further than 26.2.