The Boston Marathon is one of, if not the oldest, the most prestigious marathons held in the United States. You can’t just simply sign up for it. You have to earn a spot at the starting line. One way is to run another qualifying marathon within a specific cut-off time. If you accomplish this, then you have met the Boston Qualifying Time standards and can apply to run the race. Each year, cut-off get more and more competitive.

Also known as ‘hitting the wall’, is an unfortunate race-tanking phenomenon that happens when carbohydrate reserves drop/become depleted, typically occurring after 20 miles in the marathon. Muscle glycogen, the primary source of carbohydrates is the main fuel used during endurance activity. Once these stores become depleted, performance decreases, and runners may experience symptoms such as extreme fatigue, a sudden loss of energy, dizziness, headaches, pain, cramping, and a slew of negative emotions. Hitting the wall is as much mental as it is physical. 

The piece of paper with a designated number is attached to the shirts of the runners before the race. Bib numbers can be synchronized to the timing chips to record the runner's accurate timing throughout the marathon. The tag has a unique bib number printed in big fonts, along with the runner’s name.