pheidippides

in the recent years, i have noticed a large number of people in my generation participating in marathons. seems that it's caught on like slap bracelets in 1993. and every time i read someone's time in their facebook info, or see their myspace pic of them running across the finish line, i can't help but think, "why in the world would you want to run that far?"

but there are quite a few marathons that exist, in fact, over 100 opportunities annually to run one in the us. my hometown is proud of their go! st. louis marathon in april. not sure why they have to have an exclamation point in their title. but apparently, we are a city of exclamation points. no really, we are.

anyways, with all of the marathons, and all of the people running them, i figured there must be something great about finishing one. you've accomplished something extremely difficult, you trained for months to prepare, you dedicated yourself, and you ran a distance that i don't even enjoy driving in my car.

but then i stumbled across the history of the marathon. named for a greek city, the story is that a soldier, pheidippides, ran from athens to marathon to declare that the persians had been defeated in battle. (there are variations of the story - don't ask me to cite my source). according to legend, this young man ran the whole way without stopping...and upon arrival and announcement of his message, he collapsed dead.

so i'm back at my original question, why would you want to run a distance that killed the first man who did it? (note: this is a rhetorical question. please don't post comments about how awesome it is. i will delete them.)

seriously though, to all of you who have attempted or finished a marathon, kudos. i guess.