Barrett Hopper

The 26 Things I Have Learned by Doing Marathons Barrett Hopper

December 17, 2017, I was in Rockwall, Texas (Dallas suburb) for a weekend run. I had been pondering how to celebrate my 50th birthday in 2018 through running exploits. I announced to some of my running buddies that I wanted to run a marathon a month to celebrate. I had done a total of 21 marathons at this point over a 16-year period. So, this was a big lift for me. I had done three marathons in three months in 2014-2015 and two marathons two weeks apart in 2016 (NYC and Philadelphia). However, doing 12 in 12 months was an entire different level. I knew one thing for sure, I was going to learn quite a bit about running marathons. At the start of this blog I am 11 marathons in and have 3 more planned this year. That's right, my 12 in 12 has become 14 in 12. I wanted to use this week's blog to share the 26 things that I have learned about marathons this year.