Melfort marathon runner Robyn Luthi has completed her goal of running the six Abbott World Marathon Majors after completing the New York Marathon.
Luthi completed the New York Marathon on March 3 with a time of two hours, 50 minutes, and 45 seconds, which was another personal best.
“It feels amazing to finally have the World Major Marathons completed,” Luthi said a day after the marathon. “It’s been a goal of mine since 2021 and it’s been a lot of work so I’m super happy that it’s done. It’s a little surreal right now.”
Luthi managed to complete her goal in three years.
“Once I set my mind to it I just wanted to get them all done,” she said. “Training wise, I’ve been making really big gains in time and running, so I thought that was the time to complete them all while I was still getting faster.
“I ran a 2: 50.45, so I had almost an eight-minute PB, which is actually unheard of on the New York course because this course is extremely hilly and hard. It would be kind of comparable to Boston as far as the terrain of the course,” she added.
Luthi has found that she thrives on courses with hills in her marathon experience.
“Which is really interesting and ironic being that I come from flat land, Saskatchewan, that I can make such big gains on courses like this,” she said.
“I went into this one kind of knowing what to expect. My coach ran this one three times and he let me know where it gets a little bit tougher. The back half of this one is a is a tough course just because there is a lot of hills on the back half.”
Luthi finished 89thin the women’s division in Tokyo and seventh in her age class among 24,000 women in the race. It was her sixth marathon completed among the six ‘major’ marathons, known as the Abbott World Marathon Majors. She has previously completed marathons in Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London and Tokyo.
New York was the most interesting because of the size of the crowds, according to Luthi.
“The spectators are absolutely unreal,” she said. “I’ve never seen crowds like that at a race before and a lot of these races do have huge crowds, but the crowds in New York were second to none. They were absolutely incredible.”
Luthi estimated there were more than 55,000 people in attendance.
“When you run through Brooklyn it’s unreal,” she said. “It’s absolutely unreal. How many people are watching.”
She said that the cold weather and all weather training in Saskatchewan is always a benefit when preparing for a marathon. It means she can run in almost any kind of weather.
“Where we live I trained in up to -50 wind chills up to plus 30 Celsius, so whatever weather gets thrown at me on race day I usually can adapt fairly well to it, more so than someone that might come from like the southern states or whatnot were there just in warm climates,” she said.
Luthi said the day began cool before turning into perfect running weather.
Luthi has been accompanied by her husband and children for past marathons but for New York she had a different contingent.
“I had a friends come from Ontario, British Columbia, Saskatchewan. My sister came from Kansas, so I had a nice little cheer crew this year,” she said.
After the New York Marathon, the Seventh Star was announced for the Abbott World Marathon Majors. That means Luthi has added another marathon to her list of goals.
“Sydney just got announced yesterday as being the Seventh star,” she said. “I now completed the six and probably within the next two years I will go to Sydney and run that one as well just because why not?”
Luthi knew Sydney would be added to the list it was the home of the World Age Class Championship in September that she also earned a berth in.
“I could not do Sydney and New York because they’re just too close together and I knew if I had done Sydney they said they would give me the star if it became the 7th star, so had I got to Sydney, I’d already have the seven star, even though it just got announced,” Luthi said.
In her off time from full marathons, Luthi also won the Queen City Marathon Women’s Half Marathon in September.
“Running wise this year I’ve made significant gains, but I’ve trained extremely hard,” she said. “My workouts have been faster and harder than they’ve ever been. It’s really paying off. I’ve been making some serious big gains.”
In a half marathon, her goal would be under one hour and 24 minutes, she finished the Queen City Marathon in one hour, 23 minutes and nine seconds.
Luthi finished in two hours, 58 minutes, and 15 seconds when she competed in in the 2023 Abbott World Marathon Majors Wanda Age Class World Championships last October.
She accomplished her goal of automatically qualifying for the 2024 Wanda Age World Championship in Sydney, Australia by finishing 14th in her age group, she also finished a marathon in under three hours.
Throughout 10 marathons since 2017 she has managed to shave significant time off her finish. Her next race will be Chicago in 2025.
“I am already registered for that one just because I think I can go sub 2:50, knowing now that I just ran a 2:50.45 on a really hard course and then I am probably going to hopefully run the Canadian Half Marathon Championships as my goal for 2025 as well in Edmonton,” she said.
michael.oleksyn@paherald.sk.ca
