Marathon race report

Conventional wisdom says that running marathon is crazy, running without expensive running shoes is foolish and running marathon without marathon training is invitation to injury. I put the convention wisdom to test this year. No shoes, no fancy "carbo loading" diets and no 20mile runs every other weekend. In fact no running to speak of in last 5 months. Just wake up on a cool November morning, take a ride to the startlinw and start running.

I finished in just over 5 hours.... with no injuries. Even the DOMS are gone within three days and I am back to normal like it never happened. I am positive that this had something to do with barefoot running. For better or for worse, barefoot running made me stay fully alert about my form for all of 5 hours. I slowed down a lot when the running surface was coarse (which is very common on ny marathon course) and at every gatorade stop when it got sticky. But I was running steadily for the rest of the time at my target pace and finished strong.

I did get one blister and had it dressed at finishline. It was quite funny when I limped into the medical pit stop. Everyone gathered around me assuming there must be something really wrong with me after running barefoot and they were almost disappointed to see that it was just a minor blister. After I stepping out of there I picked up my bag. I was asked to keep moving and I said that I just need a minute to put my shoes on. The volunteer looked down at my feet and then looked up at and we started laughing. That made my day.

All in all, this was the slowest of the 4 marathons I have run but it is also the one I am most proud of. While I am the first to admit that no training is dumb, its good to know that our feet are designed to take marathon distance on moments notice and dont need shoes.

BF in NY for 966mi