NYC Marathon Right Around the Corner

The ING New York City Marathon is just a mere 25 days away on November 4. The day before the marathon, the New York Road Runners Club is hosting the 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Trials for the Men's Marathon. The NYRR has created a blog with videos and commentary called Chasing Glory. Today, there's a video of Abdi Abdirahman, the three-time U.S. 10,000 champ.

Of course, this past Sunday's Chicago Marathon raised a number of questions for marathon organizers. The unseasonably warm weather caused a number of heat-related injuries as well as one death amongst the marathoners; the Chicago Marathon organizers canceled the race a few hours in. The president of the New York Road Runners and race director of the New York City Marathon, Mary Wittenberg, was at the Chicago Marathon and told the NY Times, “The heat and humidity soared beyond what anyone expected. At the beginning of the day it looked like it would be fine. It was an act-of-God kind of day.” Still, the tragedy "raised the importance of some questions, like conditions for delaying a race or starting it earlier than planned."

The NYC marathon is looking for volunteers - check out the list of opportunities here.

Photograph of one way Chicago marathon runners were cooled down by anishvt on Flickr

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By Jen Chung on October 9, 2007 3:12 PM

Comments [rss]

Rocknrope

I agree #3, when I ran it a few years back, I remember passing a little latin woman holding a huge tray of orange slices. I was tempted to take one, but didn't (more because I wasn't sure how my stomach would react than any fear of being poisoned) but I couldn't stop thinking about those oranges for the next two miles.

cwbuecheler

The marathon is so weird. Normally in New York you would hesitate to take a fully wrapped food item from a stranger ... but while you're running, you'll just grab random orange slices stuck out at you by whomever and jam them in your mouth.

I have friends who run every year and then go drink back the calories at a local pub. I'm looking forward to my yearly tradition of waking up late, relaxing in my apartment, and then joining them at the bar. :)

Jen Chung

Our blog in Chicago, Chicagoist, suggested that entrance to the marathon be limited in the next year (also: "Bring more hoses").

Trying to run 26 miles in that kind of heat - when you haven't been training for it - seems like a huge challenge, even more than just running the marathon. It's sad and I hope things go much better in NYC next month.

matty

i was at the chicago one. it was ungodly hot. Also there were more marathoners than ever before (something like 40,000 - which is more than last year's nyc race) which totally took its toll on the water supplies.

NYC will be better off because of how late it is in the year and learning from Chicago's water supply-chain mistakes.

In a cruel twist from mother nature, only two days after the event in chicago the temperature is going to drop some 25 degrees to the mid-50's. Curses.