Half-marathon: Rodney Dangerfield of races
On Sunday I ran the San Francisco Marathon, but the first half of my race involved running with a giant gaggle of half-marathoners. This article came out in the San Francisco chronicle two days before these races.
Half-marathon: Rodney Dangerfield of races
Ellen Huet
Friday, July 27, 2012
It's the race that will kill you and still earn you no respect. It doesn't have an Olympic equivalent; it doesn't even have a name of its own. Yet runners sprint to sign up for it in far greater numbers than its prestigious sibling, the marathon.
On Sunday, when about 8,500 runners will run the full San Francisco Marathon, a whopping 14,000 will attempt one of the race's two half marathons.
Among them will be first-timers who think a grueling 13.1 miles shouldn't be called "half" of anything, as well as veterans who think loping to the finish line in an hour and a half makes for an easygoing Sunday morning.
The half's appeal, they say, is that it welcomes both groups and everyone in between.
"Before I started training about six months ago, the most I'd ever run at a time was maybe 3 miles down the Embarcadero," said Jackie Welch.
Welch, 26, and her younger sister, Becky Welch, 23, will jog side by side when they try 13.1 miles for the first time Sunday. For them, it's a feat; though they're both tall and athletic, their training runs have topped out at 12 miles.
"To be honest, when we started training we did a timed mile, and our time going hard was right around 10 minutes," Welch said. On Sunday, they'll try to hold a 10-minute-a-mile pace - until they reach the top of the Lincoln Boulevard hill in the Presidio, at which point, Welch jokes, they'll see the light at the end of the tunnel and let loose down the hill toward the finish line in Golden Gate Park.
The scenic route
San Francisco's 26.2-mile marathon route guides runners past the city's greatest hits - if they have the energy to lift their head and look around. It loops from the Ferry Building up the Embarcadero, along Crissy Field and over and back across the Golden Gate Bridge before meandering through Golden Gate Park, the Mission, Potrero Hill and back to the starting point.
While marathoners get the full treatment, half marathoners have to pick the first or second half and "it can be quite polarizing because they're so different," said race spokeswoman Joanna Reuland.
The Welch sisters, recent San Francisco transplants originally from Orange County, can't wait to run the ultra-scenic first half, which includes the jaunt across the bridge.
And Eric Jorgensen, 27, had no choice but to go for the half with the views: He's planning to snap photos on Instagram along the way and live-tweet the whole run from his phone, just like he did last year.
For those with no time for pretty views and photo filters, the less-popular second half will be the wise choice.
Lupe Cabada, a competitive runner from Reno, wants to finish the second, less-hilly half in 1 hour and 14 minutes, which means holding a pace of about 5 1/2 minutes per mile.
No big deal for Cabada, 26, who has run a marathon and does training runs of 12 to 15 miles all the time. A half marathon means a pace that is, for him, "a comfortable hard."
America's favorite
The half-marathon is America's new favorite running distance with more and more races being offered. Five times as many people finished half marathons across the country in 2011 than in 1990, according to Runner's World Magazine.
Enthusiasts who think the race deserves its own name have started an effort to rename it the Pikermi, after the Greek town halfway along the 26.2-mile span between Athens and Marathon. But the word "marathon" carries some weight as well.
"Psychologically, since it's called a half marathon and because 99 percent of normal people wouldn't attempt it, it sounds like a huge achievement - something you talk about when you go to the office on Monday morning," said Jeff Peterson, a competitive half-marathon racer from San Anselmo.
In San Francisco - and nationwide - the half marathon is increasingly a female-dominated race. In 2011, 56 percent of all half marathon finishers at the San Francisco Marathon and 59 percent nationwide were women. At the Nike Women's marathon and half-marathon hosted in San Francisco every fall, each finisher's reward is a Tiffany necklace, handed out at the finish line by San Francisco firefighters dressed in sharp suits.
'The best distance'
"My wife coaches a lot of women who were pregnant, had a kid, and started to run to get fit again," said Peterson, whose wife is also a competitive runner. "They get into it, they want to race, and a half marathon is the best distance to start because you feel the finish line the whole time, compared to 26 miles, which just sounds mammoth."
But if a half marathon were too easy, finishing one wouldn't have any reward, said Kristin Tarr, 29. Sunday will be her 16th half marathon since she started running them in 2008, and she still treats the distance with respect.
"Just because it's not the full doesn't mean it's not challenging. It's very challenging," Tarr said. "You can't just walk out your door and say you're going to run 13 miles. You can't. I mean, you can, but you're going to pay for it. It gives you something to train for that feels manageable but is still a big accomplishment."
The first half marathon and the full marathon start at 5:30 a.m. Sunday. The second half marathon starts at 8:15 a.m. The Embarcadero will be closed from Harrison Street to Broadway and will allow southbound traffic only from Harrison to AT&T Park.
Source
Would really like to get some feedback on this article, especially the 'Rodney Dangerfield' aspect of it. Too many times I've heard runners say "I only did a half", and I've blurted out at halfers "Have you ever thought of doing a whole marathon?" in a way that could be interpreted that I was downplaying their achievement. This article is making me rethink my attitude, which could have been unintentionally derogatory.
Half-marathon: Rodney Dangerfield of races
Ellen Huet
Friday, July 27, 2012
It's the race that will kill you and still earn you no respect. It doesn't have an Olympic equivalent; it doesn't even have a name of its own. Yet runners sprint to sign up for it in far greater numbers than its prestigious sibling, the marathon.
On Sunday, when about 8,500 runners will run the full San Francisco Marathon, a whopping 14,000 will attempt one of the race's two half marathons.
Among them will be first-timers who think a grueling 13.1 miles shouldn't be called "half" of anything, as well as veterans who think loping to the finish line in an hour and a half makes for an easygoing Sunday morning.
The half's appeal, they say, is that it welcomes both groups and everyone in between.
"Before I started training about six months ago, the most I'd ever run at a time was maybe 3 miles down the Embarcadero," said Jackie Welch.
Welch, 26, and her younger sister, Becky Welch, 23, will jog side by side when they try 13.1 miles for the first time Sunday. For them, it's a feat; though they're both tall and athletic, their training runs have topped out at 12 miles.
"To be honest, when we started training we did a timed mile, and our time going hard was right around 10 minutes," Welch said. On Sunday, they'll try to hold a 10-minute-a-mile pace - until they reach the top of the Lincoln Boulevard hill in the Presidio, at which point, Welch jokes, they'll see the light at the end of the tunnel and let loose down the hill toward the finish line in Golden Gate Park.
The scenic route
San Francisco's 26.2-mile marathon route guides runners past the city's greatest hits - if they have the energy to lift their head and look around. It loops from the Ferry Building up the Embarcadero, along Crissy Field and over and back across the Golden Gate Bridge before meandering through Golden Gate Park, the Mission, Potrero Hill and back to the starting point.
While marathoners get the full treatment, half marathoners have to pick the first or second half and "it can be quite polarizing because they're so different," said race spokeswoman Joanna Reuland.
The Welch sisters, recent San Francisco transplants originally from Orange County, can't wait to run the ultra-scenic first half, which includes the jaunt across the bridge.
And Eric Jorgensen, 27, had no choice but to go for the half with the views: He's planning to snap photos on Instagram along the way and live-tweet the whole run from his phone, just like he did last year.
For those with no time for pretty views and photo filters, the less-popular second half will be the wise choice.
Lupe Cabada, a competitive runner from Reno, wants to finish the second, less-hilly half in 1 hour and 14 minutes, which means holding a pace of about 5 1/2 minutes per mile.
No big deal for Cabada, 26, who has run a marathon and does training runs of 12 to 15 miles all the time. A half marathon means a pace that is, for him, "a comfortable hard."
America's favorite
The half-marathon is America's new favorite running distance with more and more races being offered. Five times as many people finished half marathons across the country in 2011 than in 1990, according to Runner's World Magazine.
Enthusiasts who think the race deserves its own name have started an effort to rename it the Pikermi, after the Greek town halfway along the 26.2-mile span between Athens and Marathon. But the word "marathon" carries some weight as well.
"Psychologically, since it's called a half marathon and because 99 percent of normal people wouldn't attempt it, it sounds like a huge achievement - something you talk about when you go to the office on Monday morning," said Jeff Peterson, a competitive half-marathon racer from San Anselmo.
In San Francisco - and nationwide - the half marathon is increasingly a female-dominated race. In 2011, 56 percent of all half marathon finishers at the San Francisco Marathon and 59 percent nationwide were women. At the Nike Women's marathon and half-marathon hosted in San Francisco every fall, each finisher's reward is a Tiffany necklace, handed out at the finish line by San Francisco firefighters dressed in sharp suits.
'The best distance'
"My wife coaches a lot of women who were pregnant, had a kid, and started to run to get fit again," said Peterson, whose wife is also a competitive runner. "They get into it, they want to race, and a half marathon is the best distance to start because you feel the finish line the whole time, compared to 26 miles, which just sounds mammoth."
But if a half marathon were too easy, finishing one wouldn't have any reward, said Kristin Tarr, 29. Sunday will be her 16th half marathon since she started running them in 2008, and she still treats the distance with respect.
"Just because it's not the full doesn't mean it's not challenging. It's very challenging," Tarr said. "You can't just walk out your door and say you're going to run 13 miles. You can't. I mean, you can, but you're going to pay for it. It gives you something to train for that feels manageable but is still a big accomplishment."
The first half marathon and the full marathon start at 5:30 a.m. Sunday. The second half marathon starts at 8:15 a.m. The Embarcadero will be closed from Harrison Street to Broadway and will allow southbound traffic only from Harrison to AT&T Park.
Source
Would really like to get some feedback on this article, especially the 'Rodney Dangerfield' aspect of it. Too many times I've heard runners say "I only did a half", and I've blurted out at halfers "Have you ever thought of doing a whole marathon?" in a way that could be interpreted that I was downplaying their achievement. This article is making me rethink my attitude, which could have been unintentionally derogatory.