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Be A 0.5 Percenter [Become a Marathon Runner From Scratch]

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What is a marathon?

26.2 Sticker Image
The 26.2 sticker is popular among those who run a full marathon.

According to Emily Abbate, a contributor to Runner’s World magazine, only 0.5 percent of the United States population has run a full marathon. For some people, being in this elite group of only 0.5 percent is one of the sole reasons why they choose to tackle such a feat. Some people are wired to want to be different than others or accomplish more than the average person does. This is not to be better than others, but a way to feel a sense of accomplishment within themselves. Running a full marathon is one of these ways. How long is a full marathon? 26.2 miles.

Among the people who consider themselves runners, 50 percent of them have never tried a full marathon. Another statistic to note is that the average time to complete a full marathon over a 20-year period has been between 4 hours 15 minutes and 4 hours 40 minutes. It was interesting that only around 80 percent of people, who start running a marathon, make it to the finish line. The Boston Marathon has the highest percentage of finishers with 97 percent.

Can anyone run a marathon? Yes! So, why don’t more people?

How do you train for a marathon?

Runners Signed Up To Run A Full Marathon

You certainly should have some running experience under your belt before training for a marathon. I was probably considered a beginner when I decided to run a full marathon but had run enough to begin marathon training. Jeff Gaudette, a writer for Active.com, defines a beginner in the following way, “a beginner is someone who has been running consistently for less than two years, or who averages less than 20-25 miles per week.” I had been running fairly consistently for probably two years.

My opinion is that anyone can run a full marathon, but you MUST train. I trained for four months. There are running plans all over the internet that you can use. Runner’s World had a good one, and that is what I used to train for the two marathons I did. It is vital to follow the plan exactly! You can find running plans on active.com.

What is the most essential item you need for training?

Technology has come a long way since I trained for my marathons. One must have item for training is either the FitBit Versa Watch, which is on sale on Amazon, or the Apple Watch Series 3. If you do not care to read your texts on your watch and don’t mind running with your phone for GPS, the FitBit Alta HR is a good option. It’s on sale on Amazon Prime Days which are July 15-16! These watches keep up with your mileage, heart rate, calories burned, and MANY other things.

Should you run one in your hometown or do a destination marathon?

Mississippi Blues Marathon–my hometown marathon

Both! I suggest running your first one in your hometown or close to it. Here’s why: recovering in your own bed after the race sure is nice. Plus, since most friends and family know that you have been busy training for four months or more, they can come to cheer you on at the end of the race. You will need the encouragement!

I ran the inaugural Mississippi Blues Marathon in Jackson, Mississippi for my first one. This was in January of 2008, and I finished around 4 hours and 30 minutes.

This marathon is nice because it’s not super crowded. Also, there is blues music along the way. The only negative is that there are potholes on lots of the Jackson streets, so you need to watch the road closely while you run.

Rock N Roll Marathon in San Diego–my destination marathon

For the second marathon that you do, I suggest choosing a fun destination. This serves as an added motivation for you. This is important because now that you know what completed a marathon is like, you may need a little more motivation to do it again.

I’ve heard it said, “No one runs a marathon because it’s fun.” This is certainly true in most ways.

I chose the Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego Marathon for my second and destination marathon. My husband ran this one with me around May 30 or 31, 2009. I didn’t train as hard for this one and finished a little slower; however, I can’t remember the exact time.

My aunt and uncle lived out there, so we enjoyed seeing them while we there.

May Gray/June Gloom

The only drawback to going there at that time was what the locals call May Gray/June Gloom. It was cloudy the whole time we were there. There should be some disclaimer on their website that yes, the temperatures aren’t bad, but for those who want to enjoy sunny California prior to the race, you can enjoy it while it’s gray outside, and kind of cold.

Incidentally, we found out from our taxi drivers (we didn’t Uber back then) and have since confirmed it through research that during this time of the year, a layer of marine stratus darkens the skies. It’s cloudy most of the day, with occasional hazy afternoon sun. The number of gloomy days varies each year, but from May 1-June 30, the locals expect it. I later researched it and found out there were 23 gloomy days that year during the two month period.

Maybe we were just oblivious, and “everyone” knows about this, but we didn’t. I do think they should make information on this weather phenomenon more visible on their website. We Mississippians were clueless.

My experience

Training to run a full marathon

Since it the one I remember the most, I will focus mainly on my first marathon training. I trained for four months in the fall. I ran my long runs for the most part in my neighborhood and some in another neighborhood close-by. Around Thanksgiving, we traveled to Callaway Gardens in Georgia, so I did my long training run there. It’s gorgeous there running on the trails. The longest that my plan had me ever run was 20 miles. I think that is fairly common. So, basically, the day of the race, you haven’t run over 20 miles but are supposed to run 26.2 that day.

The race

Balloons That A Pacer Uses To Run A Full Marathon

If you have a certain time goal in mind, you can run with someone who is called a pacer. A pacer runs with a sign that states the time that those who run with him or her should finish the race. Some people like to run with the pacer in order to meet their time goal. I, personally, have not used a pacer.

After the race, I realized why most plans don’t have you run more than 20 miles while training. I have no proof of this, but I think it’s because you wouldn’t continue the training or run the race! The last six miles of a marathon are TERRIBLE!

However, I do not advise walking during the last six miles. I tried that briefly and realized that my legs hurt just as bad when I was walking. Running gets you to the finish line faster than walking, so considering the pain is the same, run the last six miles for sure!!! By the end, it felt like needles poking into me every time I put my foot down for the next step.

After the race, the volunteers wrap a silver, foil blanket around you to help regulate your body temperature. Your body temperature will drop quickly because you are no longer working your muscles.

After the race

After the initial runner’s high had worn off, I slept the rest of the afternoon. We went to a friend’s house for dinner that night. I was very sore for the next few days, and going downstairs hurt worse than going upstairs.

Something I do remember from the San Diego race was that we were laid up in the hotel room all afternoon. I took a bath when we got back to the hotel and then slept most of the rest of the day. We were able to hobble to dinner that night. That marathon is actually where I remember going up and down stairs hurting the most.

The future

If this is making you want to run, there are 9 easy ways to become a runner. Although I do like to be in the 0.5 percenter category, I do not have plans to run another one anytime soon. Abbate has some great tips in her article in Runner’s World about marathon training basics. If you are a Goal-Oriented Runner, I highly recommend setting aside four months to train and running a full marathon!  You won’t regret it. 

What are some of your memories of your marathon? Do you have any questions on how to get started with marathon training? Please comment below.

Picture Of Me When I Was In Shape To Run A Full Marathon
Wearing my Rock N Roll San Diego Marathon Shirt after a 5k Race in Leland, MS later that summer of 2009



 

7 Hidden Money Traps for Your College Freshman Son To Avoid–Part 2

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In this two-part series, I will discuss 7 hidden money traps to avoid; they caught my son his freshman year of college. Trust me, your son doesn’t want to go through the same thing. These traps added much stress on his dad, him, and me and can certainly be avoided if there is awareness that they are out there. The traps ate up all of his savings from summer and Christmas jobs. The first two traps can be found by reading Part 1 of the 7 Hidden Money Traps.

money tree for money traps to avoid

3.  Overdraft Fees (the most expensive of the money traps to avoid)

This was a biggie. We had to tweak how to do the bank account over and over. One issue was, we never really knew how much money to give him. The following are the some of the ways that we heard that his friends dealt with money:

  • Some had unlimited funds, i.e. their parents’ credit card
  • Some lived on a cash-only basis
  • Credit cards with small limits
  • Some had an allowance but then some expenses went on their parents’ credit card, etc.
  • Some received money monthly, bi-weekly, or weekly

The bank account was the single biggest headache of the year. First, we gave him money “for the month.” That lasted one month. It’s too much money to manage at one time for someone who has never lived away from home. At least it was for us. Second, he used a bank that does not have a branch in his college town. So, at first, I would put money in his account, and when he had a low balance, it would take two to three days to get into the account. He was literally at school one weekend, during the fall season, without a penny to his name.

Seriously, Western Union?

That weekend, I had to use Western Union because I couldn’t think of another way to get money to him. He went to a CVS and picked up the cash. I felt sleazy having to send him money that way. They charged $6 for me to send him some cash. Luckily, later, somehow we found out that if you use the banking mobile app on the phone as opposed to the laptop, then the transfer is instant.

I wish I had known that from the beginning!

Third, we had had the account set up in high school with an overdraft cushion, and the debit card still worked when there was no money in the account! This was the bank’s default setting, and it was awful. That is when he accrued the most fees. We had him call the President of the bank and ask for some of the fees back with some stipulations that he had to follow, such as checking his balance on his mobile app. We changed it to where the account would not work if there was no money.

There was one glitch.

Don’t use the credit button (one of the money traps to avoid)

We didn’t know that if he pumped gas and pushed the credit button instead of debit, the card worked even with no money in the account. More overdraft fees. We were all shocked by this. More lessons learned. The banker told us this only happens at gas stations, but I don’t know if this is the case.

This issue was finally worked out as when put him on a weekly budget, had him call us when he was filling up with gas and we put that amount in the account, and told him never to push the credit button.

Cash is King

The last thing that has worked well was his idea. He devised a plan to get the cash out of his account each week, and he lives on the cash instead of his debit card. It does worry me that the money will get stolen, but so far, so good. It took a while to see what would work for him, and this topic is still a work in progress.

**Update: If they join a gym or have another reason to have automatic debits come out of their account, they must keep up with what day of the month this occurs. Also, they need to be aware of any hidden fees. My son had to pay another overdraft fee recently because he didn’t know about a yearly fee at the gym, and he had already pulled out his cash for the week.**

The trap is that they are technically still living off of our money, and yes, he has to pay for the “mistakes” with his own money, but there is still no real urgency to avoid this trap at 18 and 19 years old as opposed to how we feel as adults when we spend our money on “mistakes”.  It’s a very costly trap.

4. Cover charges at bars

I went to college at this same University and also went out to the bars and paid cover charges. However, I had NO idea the amount of money that they charge the students today. It is crazy! My son had told us the cover charges were very expensive, but I didn’t believe him until I went myself a few times. Since you can get into most places at the age of 18, they go.

When I visited on football game weekends and parents’ weekends, I quickly saw how easy it is to spend lots of money.

I paid $20-$40 cover charges at different times while visiting there during his freshman year. If you add up the Uber rides, cover charge at one bar, cover charge at sometimes a second destination, and if have a date as well, that is a very expensive night. If it’s a football game weekend or a formal event that requires two nights of this, it is easy to see how quickly the spending adds up.

The lure of this trap is you aren’t going to stay home on a big weekend when everyone else is out. This is one of the money traps that is hard to avoid, so it’s wise to save in other areas to be able to afford this one.

5. Food

Meal plan and fraternity bill

Wait…I thought we paid $1900 first semester for a meal plan (that was required by the University) and $778 second semester for the the Greek Plan. We did.  (The University will let you reduce the amount second semester if you join a fraternity in October during Rush.) He pledged a fraternity in October, so we began paying a fraternity bill which also included food, and then the second semester continued with the fraternity bill which provided three meals a day during the week.

That should have been more than enough food money. I understand that you get sick of the same choices on campus over and over, but something else I learned is that there are over 10 restaurants to choose from in several locations.

Apparently, the food at the fraternity houses isn’t the best. So those two food choices–the University and the fraternity house, although I paid for them, “got old.” I cringed every time I saw a charge at a fast food restaurant on his account prior to his going to his cash plan (I can’t see where he is spending money now because of his cash plan.)

Temptations

It is very hard for them to have self-control and force themselves to eat what has been paid for. Additionally, the University doesn’t give refunds on unused funds. Aggravating!

This trap is the oldest trick in the book. When a teenage boy is hungry, he will eat what he wants, when he wants it. Sure, the University requires a meal plan consisting of non-refundable money, and there is food at the frat house. BUT, the lure of the Cookout drive-thru hamburger trumps any of that every time.

Money spent on food was only in our weekend budget for him, so he was behind on his budget often due to spending money on food and leaving free food on the table.

6. Lock-out fees

Dorm lock-out fees are more understandable to me, and they aren’t super expensive. But, I never thought about them prior to seeing them on the bill.

He had about five lock-out fees which totaled $30. Not bad, but the trap was that the fee “just being $5” per lockout fee trumped any urgency to be really sure you were never locked out. Looking back, I’m actually surprised this amount wasn’t larger, but it’s a fee I didn’t think about.

The lure of this trap is that it only costs $5, so “oh well” if they forget their key. Of all of the money traps to avoid, this one is the least expensive.

7. Dorm move-out fines

The dorm move-out fines sent me over the edge when I saw them on the bill.

He was already home for the summer when they posted this fine on the University account. He did not check out with the resident assistant and left his bulletin board and mirror in the room.

The $10 bulletin board turned into a $40 bulletin board that didn’t come home. The $5 mirror turned into a $35 mirror that didn’t come home.

Then there was the fine for not signing out.

This added up to a total of $187.50 for him and $187.50 for his roommate. Hopefully, the University used this extra money to sanitize the mattresses or upgrade something in the dorm.

The trap was either the lure of getting on the road quickly to come home or simply being completely oblivious to the fact that there were fines. This is one of the money traps that is easy to avoid if he will take the time to follow the directions the R.A. gives them.

What were some of the money traps your son encountered? Please comment below.

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Read Laurie’s story of how her recent life experiences led to the birth of this site, White Cotton. Feel free to send her a message or subscribe to the blog.

 



7 Hidden Money Traps For Your College Freshman Son To Avoid–Part 1

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In this 2-part series, I will let you know of 7 hidden money traps that caught my son during his freshman year of college so that your son doesn’t have to go through the same thing. This article will discuss the first two traps. These traps added much stress to our lives and can certainly be avoided if there is awareness that they are out there. Considering we were paying for every penny of his college, I tried very hard to stay on top of anything money-related. Unfortunately, these traps caught us by surprise.

What is a trap?

According to the Oxford Pocket Dictionary on Google, one definition of a trap is, “a device or enclosure designed to catch and retain animals typically by allowing entry but not exit.”

Over the years, my son has trapped his fair share of critters (animals) as he is an avid outdoorsman. Because of this, we have owned several sizes of traps. Neighbors have even borrowed these traps. He always released the critters that he trapped to another area never causing them harm. The only harm to the animals was the inconvenience of being stuck in a place they didn’t want to be and having to wait on someone to release them. Obviously, sometimes they didn’t know if they would ever be released!

7 Hidden Money Traps In College
A trap can be in the form of an animal trap or a money trap.

One thing my son learned from trapping animals is that once trapped, it is nearly impossible to escape without help.

Back in his days of trapping animals, he would place food items in the trap to lure them. The animal would get close enough to go after something enticing, then BOOM. Once the door to the trap shut, the animal was trapped safely until my son relocated it away from wherever we were trying to prevent it from being.

Money traps

In comparison, there were 7 hidden money traps that my son, my husband, and I weren’t prepared for when my son entered his freshman year of college. True to design, these traps were hidden in some way and had consequences.

7 Hidden Money Traps In College

In fact, even I never saw any of them coming until it was too late.  We did make our son pay us back for all of the traps that he fell into financially, which sadly for him drained his savings account of hard-earned money from summer and Christmas jobs. Yes, these were hard lessons to learn, and it felt like the traps just kept coming and coming.

1. Parking tickets

Welcome to college

The first trap is parking tickets. I am talking about on-campus parking tickets. But, ironically, at summer orientation, the parking ticket nightmare introduced itself to him. And I was with him! Looking back, this foreshadowed the parking ticket issue.

He parallel parked his truck late at night in front of a friend’s condo where we were staying, and he went past the line and into the next parking place in front of him. Being the lone vehicle on that section of the street, and with it being dark outside, we didn’t notice that he had parked imperfectly.

The next morning, we saw a ticket on the windshield. Welcome to college.

On campus

Fast forward, and my son wasn’t able to get a parking decal for his dorm parking lot. There was only a limited number of decals available in the dorm parking lot. He had to purchase a decal in the parking garage about .3 miles away uphill. (I know, I know. Poor spoiled kid.)

The reason he couldn’t purchase a decal for the dorm parking lot was that he was in a summer school class the day that the decals became available online. Also, I was working that morning and couldn’t purchase it for him, either. This was a big, costly mistake. He should have skipped class, or I should have rescheduled my client. The decals were gone by the time he got out of class.

Unfortunately, he ended up making 18 bad decisions in the parking category. This added up to $1255 from August-May.

Sometimes he would illegally park in a spot in the parking lot of the dorm and be away from his truck for less than 10 minutes to run get something out of his room and come back to find a ticket on his windshield. Other times, after parking in the dorm parking lot on the weekends (this was allowed), he would leave his truck there until Monday. (Another ticket on the windshield.)

I’m sure the tickets also included his parking at random places on campus. That’s a big no-no.

It was a trap that he could never seem to get out of. The lure of convenience trumped the sting of having to give up his hard-earned money over and over.

2. Uber

We nipped the Uber trap in the bud after four days of his being on campus.

In high school, he never really used our Uber account even though we allowed him to. “Better to stay safe” was our motto. However, either his friends and he were angels, or they had girls that drove them around. I’m not sure…

So, we had no way of knowing that he didn’t really understand how expensive calling Uber repeatedly could be. We initially gave him his August allowance and also said he could use our Uber account for rides.

The chauffeur

As I said, we withdrew his access to our Uber account after 4 days! 

I guess he confused Uber with having a personal chauffeur.

At first, his being on the account thrilled me because I could see where all he was going. This only thrilled me for one night! After that, I realized I didn’t want to see every move he was making. That WAS NOT the plan for letting him use our Uber app. It was a weird, disturbing feeling to watch him on the app; he had been off of our Find My iPhone app for a couple of years. Ha.

Even though I didn’t want to see where all he was all hours of the night, the big issue was that he racked up $140 charges in four days. Umm, no. The trap was the enticement of having a chauffeur several times a night, as opposed to having to find parking places, especially when it comes out of your parents’ account.

On his own

So, we nipped it in the bud, and he linked his Uber account to his debit card for the rest of the year; somehow, he got by. Who knows!

Further reading

These were 2 of the 7 hidden money traps to avoid during your son’s college freshman year. Read the next 5 traps to avoid. 

Read Laurie’s story of how her recent life experiences led to the birth of this site, White Cotton.