Brian Rock 
This is a question I often see people asking – should you get a screen protector for your Garmin watch? Although some people apparently do get screen protectors, I’ve never used one. I had a Forerunner 245 for three years, and I’ve had my current Fenix 7S Pro for about a year. In all of … Read more
If you’re on the market for an entry level running watch, you should be comparing the Forerunner 55 vs 165. The full line of Garmin GPS running watches run the gamut from $100 to $200 all the way up to the low thousands. If you don’t want to shell out $500 to $1,000 for a … Read more
The Chicago Marathon has announced that it will be implementing new qualifying times for guaranteed entry, starting with the 2025 Chicago Marathon. As I began to dig into this data, I was curious about the history of these times. When did they start? Have they changed previously? I was a little surprised to find out … Read more
This week was another busy racing week. I had a cross country race on Tuesday followed by the Sunset Classic 5 Mile on Thursday. Scroll down to Thursday for a mini race report from the 5 mile race. After last week’s heat wave, I had hoped for some better weather this week. And we did … Read more
Recently, the Chicago Marathon announced that it was changing the qualifying times for guaranteed entry beginning with the 2025 Chicago Marathon. The qualifying times have been reduced across the board, but the magnitude of the change varies with age group. The age groups have also changed. Previously, qualifying times applied by decade (i.e. 20-29, 30-39, … Read more
At the beginning of the week, the weather was nice. But since then, the Northeast has been slammed by a heat wave that the media has dubbed the ‘heat dome.’ It’s the nature of marathon training through the summer that you have to suffer through some hot days. At first, it wasn’t too bad. But … Read more
Fall marathons are great. When it’s time to race, the temperatures are cooling off. There’s only one problem. You need to train through the summer – when heat and humidity can make your life miserable. As much as you might not always like running in the summer – or the winter – weather, you will … Read more
This week, we start to put the “race” in “racing season.” I’ve got two races coming up – the Fitzgerald’s 5k Lager Run (which I care about) and the RRVR Summer Series XC (which I’m not focusing on). My plan is to race the Lager Run, take it easy at the Summer Series XC race, … Read more
Next Sunday is my first race of the summer season – the Fitzgerald’s Lager Run 5k. After a couple decent workouts last week, I’ll ease up a bit this week. I’ll run an easier workout midweek to dial in race pace a bit, but I’ll skip the second workout of the week so I can … Read more
Last year, I focused heavily on marathons. I ran Philly (Nov 22), followed by Jersey City (April 23), followed by Erie (September 24). After Erie, I was able to work in a bit of training towards shorter, faster races. But I was only able to squeeze in about two months before it was time to … Read more