I've also been slightly skeptical of long-distance running as a general fitness paradigm, but that might be the strength-athlete and lifter in me worried about arthritis of the heart in marathoning.
On the financial side, while only some 50 cents out of each dollar donated might actually go to The Cause (75% efficiency in the cancer org non-profit, so 25% overhead for org and another estimated 25% for team-in-training), both TNT and the LLS (cancer org) seem like generally good organizations to support.
On the physical side, it may be somewhat dangerous to participate in marathons without proper training, according to recent medical research at Harvard which suggests that running a marathon without proper training (< 35 miles a wk) may lead to "abnormalities in heart structure and function".
On the social side, I've wondered why cancer-related activism gets so much press relative to heart-related health activism, but in talking to my friend Anniemal and seeing her TNT fundraising page, I guess I realize that even though heart disease currently is still the #1 killer (cancer is catching up still), it's not as good a Story as cancer... Cancer is the OMG plot device you throw in bad movies / fiction (& real life), and maybe some good ones too, whereas heart disease is probably what's going to kill you (or rather your parents / grandparents).
So narratively, cancer seems more striking, whereas we sort of know what causes heart disease (lack of exercise, the agro-industrial-food complex, etc.), and also we associate heart disease with old dudes (sad for women who show different signs of stroke), whereas we talk a lot about breast cancer and childhood leukemia.
A better story once again...
Anyway, in spite of the above, I'm still going to donate to help my friend Anniemal out. I don't see myself running a marathon / half-marathon any time soon, although maybe I'll train for a half-triathalon five years from now :)
Still not sure how I'm going to balance my Kettlebell practice, Buddy Lee jump rope training, Lumbar "pre-hab" (following Stuart McGill & Esther Gokhale) and Ultimate conditioning these next few months, but I'll figure something out. I think what I realized is that while intense interval training is great, I actually haven't been able to do truly high-intensity interval training (> 80% HRmax) with my amateur rope work just yet... but hopefully following a more organized rope program will help with that. (Also perhaps that running-for-a-long-time also counts as sports-specific training? Whereas interval cardio training might mainly help you endure more efficiently, you still need to do the sport-specific running-long-time work some of the time as an endurance base.)
Lumbar pre-hab has been a blocker for more intense KB work and conditioning more generally :( but it's getting better and I'm healing faster (more effectively) now that I know more about what I'm doing / treat myself-spine better. Thanks Stuart McGill & Esther Gokhale once more!
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