dangerf

Everything causes death; I would not discourage running a marathon based on your anecdote.

That's hardly good advice for a novice though. I agree somewhat for that a lot of people, they just need to get out the door and run, but there are too many people out there that think they need to run as much as possible. And that's how injuries happen. I know way too many people that have gone and done too much too soon on little training because they're not following good, practiced advice.

I agree with another poster, it is not a great idea to do both the Chicago and the NYC marathon in the same year, especially if it's your first.

Training programs are really dependent on your previous experience. If you're starting as a non-runner (or a once-a-week runner) then your training plan would be much different than someone who is running 5 times a week. Also important to take into account if you're doing it just to do it or doing it to do well.

I used a plan that was based on a Pfitzinger plan. It was helpful (I got a Boston Qualifier on my first marathon), but you need to be quite disciplined. It is high mileage and takes commitment to running 6-7 days a week.

A 21km run though is really insufficient though for your long run!

From the linked Huff Po article: "I was doing a lot of programming from home. I would write out the program on paper using Fortran [a programming language], then I would mail it in to key punch operators at NYU, they would punch the cards out and then I would use the cards to run the program."

Programming on paper from home, that's incredible.

Of course it's true that sexism exists - plenty of women do choose to be silent on issues of sexism. It is an incredibly hard to bring up such a personal thing when you want to be taken seriously professionally.