My marathon story began in the beginning of September when my roommate Alpay said that we should set ourselves a goal to motivate us to exercise and suggested running a marathon. Having done almost no endurance training in my life, I blindly agreed. We quickly found some references online, built a marathon training program and started hitting the gym five times a week. The first day, I ran for half an hour at a pretty slow pace, and my body was so sore I had trouble walking or sitting the next day. However, I soon started getting used to the many miles each week, and it gave me great satisfaction to see my heart, lungs and muscles adapt to long distance running.

Neither Alpay nor I had much idea about what marathons were out there, and what would be best for us to run. We had heard of a couple famous ones, like Boston and New York, but we wanted to run a marathon that would be best for beginners like us. Probably owing to the fact that I'm a developer there, I went on Hunch and played the Marathons topic. I answered a couple questions about marathons, and the top recommendation Hunch gave was the Honolulu Marathon on December 13th; I couldn't think of a better place myself!

Before I knew it, I was on a 12 hour flight to Honolulu, leaving the freezing weather of New York for the tropical warmth of Hawaii with Alpay. As (my boss) Chris pointed out, Hawaii was all that it's advertised, great beauty, great people, great culture. We spent the day before the marathon taking a short run, swimming, relaxing on the beach and exploring great restaurants to get lots of carbs. We slept early that night, but I was so excited that I couldn't sleep much. I woke up early next day, put on my running gear and headed out of the hotel. As we walked towards the start line, more and more people joined us from the side streets and we were suddenly in a group of a hundred people.

My next stop is the Miami Marathon on January 31st. And this time, our runners club just doubled in size with the addition of Ayse and Selin who are coming to Miami with Alpay and I to run a half marathon. I does feel good inspire people to do something good for themselves! Check below for some photos taken during the run.