Be careful when giving running advice:
Back in the early part of the century I got on the bus to ride to my second Deseret News marathon, my fifth marathon in my life. This marathon is unique because we travel to the start line each year in nice buses rather than school buses.
Ended up sitting next to a young woman who told me in our conversation that she was running her first marathon. She asked several questions about running a marathon, I provided what I thought was pretty good advice based on my 13 months of marathon experience and four previous marathons.
One of the later questions was what my time goal would be. At that time, for me, finishing under 4 hours was a great accomplishment, so I shared my sub four hour goal and showed a copy of my paper pace band I had made for the race that was fastened around my right wrist.
I asked “how about a goal for you”?
Her response? “I will finish under 3 hours, and I will probably win”.
I found out later that the race promoters had flown her down to run their race and she was some college track star in the northwest.
I was cautious about giving out any running advice for quite a while after that, and my time was 4:02:41, the first time I had ever gone over four hours to date.
Frank has run 103 marathons and 3 ultras. He considers any exercise that is not running to be a waste of time. His running music of choice is Nightwish, though he is also a huge fan of Cher. Frank currently lives with his wife in West Jordan, Utah.
Race Directors Note: Frank is a good personal friend that I have known for many years. We currently run together on a weekly basis, and I have run several marathons with him. Through these many interactions I have heard many of the stories that we are sharing on this blog, and I thought it was about time for the rest of the world to hear them. So I hope you all enjoy Fridays with Frank.
-Andrew
