Race preview: Blue Ridge Marathon

WHERE ARE WE GOING?
Roanoke, Va.

WHEN?
Saturday, April 20

WHY?
Blue Ridge Marathon... or more specifically, the Official Unofficial Double Blue Ridge Marathon (a small group of runners, myself included, will gather at the start at 2:30 a.m. to run the course before the actual race begins at 7:35)

NO REALLY, WHY?
It's a side trip on a family vacation and will let me cross Virginia off my 50 states list, something I couldn't get done at Old Dominion last year. As a bonus, running the 26.2-mile warm-up lets me claim a considerable discount on the registration fee. Score!

WHO ELSE IS GOING?
The marathon had about 300 finishers last year. It looks like I'll have a dozen or so of them joining me for the warm-up.

WHAT'S THE FORECAST?
The weather should be pretty fantastic with a morning low of 45 and an afternoon high of 62. There's a chance of a thunderstorm late on Friday; hopefully it won't be any later than that.

HOW DO WE WIN?
Running a marathon makes it tough to run another marathon immediately afterward. It doesn't help that each marathon has 3,600-plus feet of elevation gain, the reason Blue Ridge is called the toughest road marathon in the country. I'm planning on another race the following weekend so my level of success will be determined by whether I enter the 52-mile trail race, the paved trail marathon, or neither.