Running Shorts

2:02:57. It's official: the marathon has been figured out. The marathon has always had an element of mystique about it: super fast speeds for super far distance. No one really knew how to race it, and even fewer people truly understood how to train for it. In case you hadn't heard, Dennis Kimetto broke the former world record of 2:03:23 in Berlin this weekend, running the above-mentioned time. Oh yeah, and the second-place finisher, Emmanuel Mutai, also ran under the old record time, finishing in 2:03:13. How ridiculous has the marathon become in the past 5 years? Here are some stats: 2:02:57 is 4:41 pace per mile and 14:34 pace per 5k. My road 5k PR is 14:33 . One of his 5k splits was 14:09, faster than I've ever run a 5k (I ran 14:13 on the track once in college). The second place finisher (2:03:13) also broke the previous world record. Talk about bittersweet: you just ran a world record!...But you finished second, so it doesn't actually count . Kimetto ...

So I never actually posted much of a response to the 2013 Boston Marathon, even though I participated in one of the most infamous sports events in recent memory. I'm not really a big fan of rushing to judgment or making quick emotional responses, and in the immediate aftermath of the race every response was bound to be emotional. One year is plenty of time removed from the race, time to gain some perspective on the race itself and aftermath of the race. What are some of the take-aways from the event? 1. Finishing time from last year is irrelevant. After everything that went down, one's finishing time seems wildly insignificant. It just goes to show that there are more important things in the real world than athletic competition. 2a. Boston (and the country, to an extent) rallied around the sports community. We really saw the escapist and healing power of sports. If you've ever wondering why we partake in athletics, we learned why: they put our best qualities on displa...