Marathon Man in Woodbury

Woodbury’s marathon man Larry Thompson shares the exhilaration that’s inspired him to complete more than 100 marathons.

By: Andy Greder | From the issue: June 2011

Photo: Courtesy of Larry Thompson

Larry Thompson trains for this year's Grandma's Marathon.

It does suffice to call Larry Thompson a junkie. His fix is running, and he’s addicted.

The 60-year-old Woodbury resident has completed 115 marathons in 50 states plus Washington, D.C.—and he’s done it all since he turned 40.

“It caught on,” Thompson says. “Once you start running, you get that high from it. You don’t want to quit doing it. It’s an endorphin rush. I’ve never used drugs, so I don’t have a clue what that’s like, but once you’re done running, you get a high. You feel good about what you’ve done.”

Thompson’s “runner’s high” had to initially overcome a low in his first 26.2-mile endurance test, the Twin Cities Marathon in 1990. “The first marathon I did was my worst,” he says.

A former high school and junior college wrestler, Thompson injured his ankle during training runs and wasn’t in the best shape on race day. But he pushed through to finish in four hours and 35 minutes. That time remains his worst ever, but it set a standard: Thompson finishes every marathon he enters. With 115 and counting, that’s an average of more than five marathons each year.

Nathan Thompson says his father is clearly zealous and points to examples of his experience in the U.S. Army and Minnesota National Guard as well as his 30 years as a sonographer at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis.

“He’s passionate about anything he does,” Nathan Thompson says. “He is definitely not a quitter. When he gets into something, he takes it to the max, with his work and anything. He is a really driven person.”

A fellow National Guard peer pressured Thompson to run in 1990, and he’s been hooked ever since. By the late 1990s, he was running 12 to 14 marathons per year, and in 2003, he flew to New England for two marathons in 48 hours. On Saturday, he ran in Burlington, Vermont, and then sped to Bar Harbor, Maine to race on Sunday. One weekend, 52.4 miles.

His jet-setting race highlights include an encounter with a stubborn moose on the course in Anchorage, Alaska; participating in the 100th running of the Boston Marathon in 1996; and checking off his 50th state/100th overall marathon in 2005 in Honolulu. The Hawaii race, which brought him back to where he was stationed during the Army, earned him membership in the 50 States and D.C. Marathon Group.

After picking up running, Thompson says, “I’m more motivated to see [things] to completion. After running those kinds of distances, you really have to be focused on what you need to accomplish things.”

Thompson’s “weekend warrior” mentality also shows up during two 12-hour shifts at the hospital each weekend. “Running makes it so much easier,” he says. “People ask, ‘How do you have the energy to do it when you do all this running?’ They have never had that endorphin high. They don’t understand what it’s like to get to that point and push through and not get physically tired out. Running marathons will tire you out, but after you do it for awhile, it becomes normal.”

Thompson’s Training Tips

Know your own body. “You have to know what your capabilities are. The mistake is thinking you have to get in a certain number of miles and injuring yourself.”

Start off slow. “Before you do a marathon, you want to run a half-marathon. You want to start training for something smaller and build up to it. It’s all about increasing miles, but not too much.”

Run every other day. “Take a day off in between; I’ve found out that the recovery and the sleep time is just as important as the actual training.”

Load up on carbohydrates. “The idea of carbo-loading the night before a marathon is really a myth. You’ve got to carbo-load after every run. You are burning up a lot of calories, so you need to replenish everything that you are expending.”

Stretching isn’t vital, warming up is. “I don’t think stretching is all that important. Either you have flexibility or you don’t. The more important thing is that you warm up properly before you go out and run, especially if you are trying to run faster. You have to make sure you don’t pull a muscle or injure yourself.”

Take care of your feet with quality shoes. “You need to go to a running shoe store, where the people that are fitting your shoes know how to do it properly. Shoes are pretty important in preventing foot injuries. And when you get a new pair of shoes, break them in slowly.”