In 2006 Dane Rauschenberg ran a marathon every weekend of the year. His feat of traveling to big cities and small towns across North America to run an official 26.2-mile race was recounted in the book See Dane Run. Running Matters is his new weekly blog for Blue Ridge Outdoors.

A few years ago, I ran a race wherein the winners were not the ones who got to the finish the fastest but rather the ones who got to the finish fastest when you also subtracted age-grading variables. For those who do not know, age grading stems from the undeniable fact that both men and [...]

Let me state this unequivocally.  There is no “purity” of ultrarunning. Why am I even stating this?
As the Winter Olympics end, and with the Summer Olympics over two years away, some people who love this international gathering of athletes and the spectacle (good and bad) with which it brings, have made clamoring about the possibility [...]

As runners we are often told, “I am sure you can eat whatever you want, you run so much.”
To some extent, especially for younger runners with their high-burning engines, this is true.  Any calories into the body will not spend a second hiding abs or piling onto hips or butts.  However, this is not necessarily [...]

Recently a discussion on a few Internet forums surfaced about the use of a personal best achieved on a course with either a moderate or large amount of downhill. With the rapid filling of the Boston Marathon this past fall, many were lamenting that too many runners had snuck in the back door by using [...]

Failing, at anything, is not fun. Fortunately, it is rarely fatal or final.
The first weekend of February, I was in Huntsville, Texas, to crush my 50-mile PR, win the race, and do it all in the name of training for my 204-mile solo running of the American Odyssey Relay in April. Well, at least I [...]

Meb Keflezighi won the New York City Marathon last November. During the race, instead of the usual sponsor splashed across his chest, Meb was wearing a singlet showing the country he is a citizen of: the United States of America. As the first American to win the race, male or female, since 1982, it was [...]

It matters not whether you are talking about a 5K, 15K, or 50K, when mentioning an upcoming race, you will run into someone who feels any sort of long-distance running is “crazy,” and they only run “if someone is chasing me!” Ha Ha!
Dealing with comments from non-runners is part of the task of being a [...]

How many times have you encountered a running friend who, perhaps in the middle of a slump or dealing with an injury, has said they “HAVE to do X miles today?” I readily admit I used to be one of those runners.
To clarify, I use the past tense in describing myself as such not because [...]

This past weekend I was in Houston for a book signing at the Houston Marathon expo.  Not participating in the race, I was elated to see the marathon would be covered live on television. Eschewing a run outside, I instead hit the treadmill, so I could watch the race on TV.
First things first, I have [...]

A wonderful thing has been happening in the past decade or so: Americans are running. From 5Ks on up to the marathon and beyond, the nation is experiencing a running boom unlike no other. The American elite is winning marathons while further on down the ladder, runners fill the ranks from age group aces to [...]

Unfortunately, I am not as in shape as I would like to be right now. Unless, as the old joke says, you count “round” as a shape. But I am getting there.
Perhaps I am being a little hard on myself as I know I am far from fat. But, in August, while cycling, I was [...]