Fellow Slowtwitchers,
I come to you in need and desperation. I have recently moved to the NYC area and was lucky enough to get into the New York City Marathon, which will be my third. I am looking for a marathon training group, and have had a lot of difficulty finding one. Before anyone recommends the New York Road Runners Association, be aware that I have spent a lot of time on their website and tried contacting them to no avail (check out the website for yourself – to call it byzantine when it comes to simply finding a marathon training group would be an understatement). I am looking for specific clubs within New York Road Runners or elsewhere in the area that have marathon training groups – primarily for weekend long runs. If anyone has any suggestions (including contact information if possible), I would really appreciate it. I am also open to just finding a training partner – I do shorter runs at 7:00-7:30/mile pace, long runs at 8:00/mile pace, and live in Hoboken. Thanks in advance!
I run with the Central Park Track Club. It’s the biggest running club in the city. No organized long runs on the weekend, but there are organized speed workouts on Tuesday (Lower East Side track) and Thursday (Central Park). There are usually groups of people going long on the weekend, though, so it isn’t hard to find running partners. NY Marathon is obviously a focus for many.
I started running with the club this year and I really enjoy it. There are a lot of very fast runners - lots of people in the 2:40-2:50 range - but also mere mortals in the 3:00-3:30 range. You’d probably run in the B group for speed workouts.
This has been a triathlon focused season for me, but the Thursday workouts have helped.
Go to www.centralparktc.org for more info.
Hi, try the New York Flyers at NYflyers.org
Very social group with all ages and abilities
Daily group runs and lot of long runs over week end with all paces
I was a NY Flyers 10 years ago and ran 10 NYC marathons with them.
I am now in Beijing and planning to do the BJ marathon as my 49th marathon.
New York Road Runners club organize half marathon and two or three longs runs in central park that will help you with training. For the long runs with NYRRC you can even choose your pace group so you can train at marathon pace.
NYC was my first marathon and I still consider it the best marathon I have done so far (and I have done quite a lot that were nice but only NYC has this energy coming from runners and even more from the crowd).
Enjoy it.
Philippw
Terrier Tri has a NYC specific training program that has already started, though they may still accept new runners: www.terriertri.com
Also, I just saw yesterday that Urban Athletics has started a group: http://www.urbanathleticsnyc.com/training.html
Good luck!
Come over to Chicago! We have pleanty on the lakefront on the weekends. Now even the groups have groups within them. you can find at least 3 different charity/marathon training group for every single disease out there.