How sluggish newbies ruined the marathon. By Gabriel Sherman - Slate Magazine

The thing I really love about
How sluggish newbies ruined the marathon. By Gabriel Sherman - Slate Magazine
, recently published on Slate, is the way that it allows people who haven't run any marathons, such as myself, feel superior to those who have. After 8 years of interscholastic cross country (high school and country) and intermittent training since then, I feel that I've got enough cred not to be considered a newbie at distance running. On the otherhand, I've never run a marathon. But see, I've always meant to run it the right way with appropriate speed and seriousness. (Note, a 4:00 marathon requires about a 10-minute mile, which is roughly my mile split when I run more than five miles.) Hence, it's not lack of dedication that's kept me from running the long race, it's love of the sport.

Convenient how that works.