The Start

11-23-11
I'm starting this blog today to chart my progress and help me to remember what I am doing and why.   The story starts about 5 weeks ago when Tom Flanagan, an attorney friend of mine, suggested that I run in the Hampton Beach half marathon with him in February of next year.  After jokingly saying sure, I thought about it and then started to take it a bit more seriously.  I had been going to the gym for since about May of this year trying to get back into some decent shape more for golf than anything else.   This just seemed like something to train for and work toward over the winter off season.  About four weeks ago I did my first 6 mile run, where I really worked on pacing myself and completing it without walking.  Since I have been slowly working up adding about a mile per week, running a long run on Saturday or Sunday and doing 2 or 3 weekly maintenance runs of 2-4 miles.  This last weekend I finished 9 miles feeling pretty good. Which brings me to this week.    

I have always in some way always thought about running the Boston Marathon.   It is sort of on my bucket list.   At this point if I keep adding a mile or so a week, I’ll be well past the 13.1 I’ll need for the February half marathon, so my thinking is that why not just keep on training through the winter and have myself ready to run 26.2.  So with that in mind I started to do some research about getting into the Boston Marathon. 

After looking around, you practically have to be half Kenyan just to qualify, doing a qualifying marathon in under 3:15 to qualify.  At this point my goal would be to finish in under 4 hours.   The only other route to go would be to get a guaranteed spot offered to about 25 charities that you have to raise 4k for to get your spot.   Looking a little further it made even a little more sense in that I could run this marathon, scratch this weird itch that I’ve had for some reason, and raise some money for a great cause at the same time, seems to make sense at this point in my life.

I contacted Jill Perriera from the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society for a couple reasons.  I know that they are a reputable association from other friends doing fun raising for them as well as the fact that Amy’s grandfather whom she was very close with passed away earlier this year from Leukemia  and it would be nice to run in honor of a great man who helped shape my wife into the fantastic woman and mom that she is today.   I submitted my application yesterday and am awaiting a response from them probably beginning of next week at this point with the Thanksgiving holiday tomorrow and the long weekend.

All if this stuff coming together over the last week or so and with some of the other events going on at the same time have brought me to an interesting and I feel like a changing point in my life.  At this point, I’ve only told Amy and my secretary Peggy that I’m planning on doing it and they both think I’m pretty much nuts.  Before I submitted the application to Leukemia and Lymphoma Society  I asked Amy if she thought I was biting off more than I could chew and she said, “ya, but that’s what we do”. 

It’s led me over the last day or so to contemplate where I am in my life and why on earth I’m doing this.  I’ve never been a runner, in fact I sort of don’t like it.  What I like about it is the time for myself and the sense of me against the road.  I guess I’ll have to get into that next time.