The 90% Barefoot City of Trees Marathon 2014
By Laura Blodgett
Here are two important lists related to this first ever marathon that I ran, and ran 90% barefoot, on Sunday, October 12, 2014. These lists are a summary of the challenges and advantages I had going into the City of Trees Marathon in Boise, Idaho.
Challenges:
- It was my first official marathon.
- I had not been able to run the course ahead of time to determine barefoot level.
- I knew I was quite likely to be facing about 5 hours of running.
- I had strained my right lower leg 6 weeks prior to the race, then my left quad about 3 weeks before.
- My mom had been diagnosed with aggressive brain cancer about 2 months before the race and I was devoted to spending a lot of time caring for her and helping my dad.
- My mom, whom I was very close to, died exactly 1 week before the race.
Advantages:
- My husband is a very supportive and wise coach.
- The rest of my family was also very encouraging and helpful about scheduling what training I could while my mom was sick.
- I have 4 years of barefoot running experience. (read here to begin to learn about barefoot running)
- I have been implementing a maximum aerobic function (MAF) approach to my training for a year, and this has made my running efforts much more comfortable.
- I have a spinning bike in my basement and a swimming pool with a current generator in my backyard for alternative training.
- I have previously run some races barefoot, including the Shamrock Shuffle 10K (here is my pre-race evaluation of that course) and the Great Potato 2014 half marathon this spring.
- I have run 2 complete half marathons, one half in minimalist running moccasins (my Moc3′s), and the half marathon I mentioned above.
- I had run several long runs completely barefoot, including one 26.2 miler before my leg difficulties.
- I have run in extreme weather conditions of both hot and cold.
- Hills were part of my training runs now and then throughout my training, although never something I worked “hard” on.
- The weather was perfect on race day.
For further reading, visit: http://dailyimprovisations.com/90-barefoot-city-trees-marathon-2014/
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