One of Beyond.com’s premier career sites, PhillyJobs.com, will be sponsoring the Philadelphia Marathon on Sunday, November 22nd. On race day, PhillyJobs.com will be hosting a Cheer Zone at 21st and Chestnut Street in Philadelphia to support the marathon runners, pump up the crowd and share in the excitement with over 100,000 runners and spectators.
PhillyJobs.com will also be cheering on three team members who are running the marathon: David Brensilber, Justin Aurand, and Soon Yu. For those of you interested in reading more about what it’s like to run a marathon, David Brensilber will be blogging about his experience. Below are a few thoughts from David prior to the race:
I am training for the Philadelphia Half-Marathon later this month. While I was at work, I was discussing how my training was going when one of my co-workers commented that she could not believe how slow I run (in fact, I think the joke was that she could walk the race at my pace!)
Slightly insulted by this jab, I began to think about the real reason why I was participating in the Philadelphia Half Marathon. It was not to win, but rather to participate. For those who argue that I am too slow to participate, I wonder how they would feel if a world class marathon runner would say the same thing to them. While I may not run the race at an 8-minute mile pace, I’m also not trying to compete with top runners such as Joan Benoit Samuelson, who recently completed the New York City Marathon in 2 hours 49 minutes and 9 seconds. To bring a frame of reference to this time, most casual marathon runners will not even break 4 hours!
The reason why people chose to run in marathons vary according to their goals. Some want to achieve a personal goal, while others want to raise money for a charity. For me, I want to participate in this event for the same reason why people climb mountains - because it is there.
Either way, I’m looking forward to running the marathon and will be blogging more about my experience after race day. Remember to check back if you’d like to read more! - David Brensilber
