Zach Runs Chicago

Sometimes as a mature adult with responsibilities and goals you have to wake up at 5:30 in the morning, put on your running shoes and go out and run 8 miles... in the shape of a dick. So that's what RunKeeper and I did this morning on the streets of Chicago. I feel so accomplished: Thank you to the original dick-runner for the inspiration. My crude run-drawing skills are nothing to yours Claire.

Sometimes those of us who live in the city can forget what a big deal the Bank of America Chicago Marathon is. Well, not really, that would be pretty hard to do considering just what a big deal it actually is. But, when you’re used to living in the city (and maybe you have a few Chicago Marathons under your belt) you can forget that this is a World Marathon Major (an elite group of marathons that only includes Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London, New York City and Tokyo). And while we may just be taking the train downtown to run on October 12th, people will be coming from all over the world to run this marathon. Joe O’Reilly is one of those people. Coming in from Dublin next month, Chicago will mark O’Reilly’s 7th marathon (he’s previously completed four in Ireland as well as Paris and Berlin). Four years ago he wouldn’t have guessed he’d be making this trip. “I got into running as part of a weight-loss journey I took four or so years ago where I lost about 90-95 pounds,” says O’R

Back in April, after the Ravenswood Run , I got a post-race massage that was especially memorable to me (if you've gotten enough post-race massages, you probably know that they're helpful, but they also kind of start to blend together). This one was different and I wrote about it at the time (from April ): Before I left though I got a free 10-minute sports massage from Molly Coeling . She and another massage therapist were there for the Fleet Feet No Boundaries group but they were nice enough to let me slip in and get a massage as long as I promised to hop up if anyone from the No Boundaries group came over while I was there. I told her about my IT-band injury from last year and she worked over my left side pretty well. Definitely something I needed done before I headed to the second race (and just in general). Luckily no one from No Boundaries came over while I was there so I got the full massage.  This week, with my IT-band acting up and the Chicago Ma