Birthday Post & Marathon Preview

It's my birthday today, and I just received a great gift (well, a gift I need to pay for): I was selected in the Marine Corps Marathon (MCM) lottery. Therefore, I'll be running my 3rd Marine Corps Marathon in October. I've never done any marathon more than twice, so this will be a record. Some people may wonder why I haven't run MCM more times, after living just a couple miles from the starting line for several years. In fact, I've run the MCM 10K more times than the marathon. Some years I had other race goals, or injuries, so I chose not to run the marathon. I ran MCM in 2006 and 2015. And 2017 will make three.


I'll still need to run MCM two more times to qualify for the Runners Club, which will allow me early entry (no more lottery) for any future MCM. We'll see how that goes. For now, I'm just happy that I'm in for 2017. It will be my first MCM since moving to Columbus, so I'll need to book travel. Southwest usually has good deals, so I'll watch for those. I've already booked a hotel within walking distance of the start. So...Happy Birthday to me!

Another exciting thing is happening today, and I'm paying for this one too. In a few hours I'll be flying off to Rome to run the Rome Marathon this Sunday. I'll stay in Europe for the week, ending up in Paris the following weekend for the Paris Marathon. So, two European marathons in two weekends. I've done this before: Berlin and Jersey in 2015. Should be fun! I've been to Rome, but not to Paris, so that will be all new. I'll be traveling without a computer and I'm not sure how well blogging will go with my phone, so I might not catch everyone up on the Rome and Paris races until I return home. In the interim, here are some images from those races.

Wow, what a starting line! (Photo credit: Maratona di Roma)
Another awesome start! (Photo credit: Schneider Electric Marathon de Paris)

So, that's what's going on with Birthday 2017. I'm treating myself to some great experiences. It sure beats what I usually do, which is almost nothing at all. This year I'm going to have fun. Happy Birthday to me!

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