One freshman is hitting the ground running outside of the classroom.
Tim Marquardt, freshman in aerospace engineering, is currently training to run the 115th Boston Marathon April 18.
The Boston Marathon is the world’s oldest annual marathon and requires applicants submit a qualifying time to be verified by marathon officials.
Marquardt ran track and cross- country at his Florida high school and said he has been distance running since he was about 10 years old.
“I guess I started in the fourth grade,” Marquardt said. “The elementary (school) had a running club once a year for a couple of months.
“It was usually about a two-month season,” he said. “Then when I got to middle school I started running track and started cross-country in 10th grade.”
In high school, Marquardt ran competitively while receiving a National Merit Scholar and becoming the valedictorian of his graduating class.
Finding time to run 10 miles daily is difficult, and Marquardt said it sometimes interferes with school and homework.
“My attitude toward this has always been to see how good I can get,” Marquardt said. “Lately, I’ve put all my effort into running and seeing what happens. I’ve been having trouble putting enough time and effort into school because I’m usually pretty exhausted from the running.”
Marquardt has only run one marathon, but said he has run between 40 and 50 5Ks.
His dorm room wall is covered in the numbers he has worn in those races.
Although he has only missed three days running this year, Marquardt said he struggles to motivate himself some days.
“It can be sometimes, there are days when I really don’t want to,” Marquardt said, “but I’ve been doing it for so long, and it’s such a big deal for me that I’ve got in the habit.”
Marquardt said he generally runs alone, but is occasionally joined by friends.
“I train almost entirely on my own, and since I don’t have anyone to run with I can create my own schedule,” Marquardt said.
He said he finds it hardest to run when home on break.
“I got very close to pulling my right calf muscle before Thanksgiving break, so I had to take a week off,” Marquardt said. “Then, I did the same thing to my left calf over Christmas break.”
Marquardt said he generally only runs on a track for short-distance workouts, but trains for distance running around town and campus.
“I’ll go on the track when I am doing 400-meter sprints or something like that where I need to measure it out,” Marquardt said. “I go a bunch of different routes around town, but I usually end up going out over the interstate. There are some roads out there that aren’t as busy so I don’t have to worry about the traffic as much.”
After the Boston Marathon next week, Marquardt said he plans on taking a week off and starting back his training slow after that.
He also said he is working on expanding his running experience and improving his times.
“I have a feeling I’m going to run this one and keep up with the training because I’m in pretty good shape,” Marquardt said. “I’m going to see if I can find another marathon to run this summer or otherwise just shift to a different event.
“I want to get both my mile and 5K times down.”
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