The Grand Return of the Central Park Marathon
Back in 1970, a group of runners met in Central Park to compete in the first New York Marathon. There were no title sponsors, no roaring fans, not even a timing chip to accurately record each individual's time. Out of the 127 runners, only 55 runners actually crossed the finish line.
Back in 1970, a group of runners met in Central Park to compete in the first New York Marathon. There were no title sponsors, no roaring fans, not even a timing chip to accurately record each individual's time. Out of the 127 runners, only 55 runners actually crossed the finish line. After all, the idea of running 26.2 miles for fun seemed ludicrous. Never did one imagine that over 40 years later, the race would move out of the park and into the streets of New York and grow to be the largest, and arguably most successful, road race of all time.
This past weekend, the park played host to another Central Park marathon, the first full co-ed marathon to be held in the park since the early days of the New York Marathon. Like the first time around, there wasn't a whole lot of fanfare. Just a comfortable, casual gathering of runners planning to go for a pretty long run together.
When NYC Runs, a grass roots organization relatively new to the New York running scene, announced they were planning on staging their own Central Park marathon a few months ago, it caught my interest. I hadeven thought was under the delusion that perhaps I would even be able to run it depending on my leg's recovery time. Clearly, running a full marathon this spring isn't in the cards for me. But, once NYC Runs added a half marathon option to the race as well, I knew I was sold. Surely, I could handle the distance of the half, and I could use it as a training run in prep for my goal race glorious comeback in May.
The race ended up being such a wonderful experience. It really felt like a small town race in the big city, something I haven't ever really experienced in a Central Park race. There were just enough race day amenities to make it feel like a race (finisher medals, hoodie tech race shirts, bag check, water stops about every 2 miles, heat sheets and beanies at the beanies, and the most delicious post race spread I've ever seen), but the field was small enough and atmosphere casual enough to retain that small town charm.
And my run itself? My goal was to keep it easy, a similar effort to my long runs. And, despite the hills of the park, I ended up clocking in over 12 minutes faster than my time in Miami. Hopefully a sign of more good things to come!
This past weekend, the park played host to another Central Park marathon, the first full co-ed marathon to be held in the park since the early days of the New York Marathon. Like the first time around, there wasn't a whole lot of fanfare. Just a comfortable, casual gathering of runners planning to go for a pretty long run together.
When NYC Runs, a grass roots organization relatively new to the New York running scene, announced they were planning on staging their own Central Park marathon a few months ago, it caught my interest. I had
The race ended up being such a wonderful experience. It really felt like a small town race in the big city, something I haven't ever really experienced in a Central Park race. There were just enough race day amenities to make it feel like a race (finisher medals, hoodie tech race shirts, bag check, water stops about every 2 miles, heat sheets and beanies at the beanies, and the most delicious post race spread I've ever seen), but the field was small enough and atmosphere casual enough to retain that small town charm.
And my run itself? My goal was to keep it easy, a similar effort to my long runs. And, despite the hills of the park, I ended up clocking in over 12 minutes faster than my time in Miami. Hopefully a sign of more good things to come!
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