My fall race for next year will likely be the Baystate Marathon that takes place in Lowell, Massachusetts in October. I think I learned about this race early last year and was surprised I never knew about it. I went to college at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell and I live less than an hour from the event and I'd never even heard of it before. When I went to Myrtle Beach to run my first marathon last year, I was shocked at how few of the locals seemed to know about this event, I think it had something like 17,000 runners (marathon and half marathon), I mean it was a lot of people jamming up the streets. The Baystate Marathon is considerably smaller than the Myrtle Beach Marathon, and since I wasn't a runner back in my school days, I guess I really shouldn't be surprised that I never knew about it. It still seems mind boggling that there's not more general knowledge of an event that stops traffic and has several hundred to several thousands of people in the road.
I'm definitely decided on running the Vermont City Marathon next year, and I'm fairly certain about Baystate. The thing about the Baystate Marathon is it's convenient, so there's relatively no coordination required, i.e. travel and hotel arrangements, so it's possible that if another fall event catches my eye between now and then, well, I can always run Baystate in 2014. I've added countdown timers for both events in the left column at the bottom.
Are you sure you don't want to do the Niagara 100K Ultra (mid-June in 2013) barefoot with me? :)
ReplyDeleteLOL, I'd love to, but not in 2013 ;)
ReplyDeleteI'm seriously considering it. It's beyond all reason, really, but...
ReplyDeleteAlan - I believe you're up to the task, but I have a ways to go before I attempt my first ultra. Other than knowing I wanted to run an ultra, I've not really set a timeframe of when that might be. The marathon distance continues to be quite a challenge for me, while I can obviously finish marathons, I'm far from a performance I'm happy with. I'm feeling confident that Toronto will see a finish time around 4:15. The best marathon performance-wise was Smuttynose this past October, but that was still over my outside time window of 4:30 (my time was something like 4:42), and I'd been looking for something closer to 4:15. I've come away a little smarter after each event, which is why I'm feeling confident about Toronto, and is also why I know I'm not ready for an ultra quite yet. Thanks to Hyannis, I know I can run a long distance without being prepared, and while having a certain satisfaction in just completing it, it's not something I intend to repeat. Perhaps after completing the Toronto, Vermont City, and probably Baystate marathons I'll be more inclined to dedication 2014 to the year I attempt my first ultra, but I don't think that first one is going to be a 100K. That being said, if you decide to run an ultra next year and it works my with planned race schedule (mostly around the VT City) then I'd be more than happy to volunteer to be part of your support crew and/or a pacer.
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