Marathon Career
Mark started his marathon career as a member of the LA Roadrunners, the official training program of the Los Angeles Marathon. He found his passion in marathon running and never looked back. When you run your first marathon, you will either catch the fever or it will be your first and last. For Mark, it became one of numerous marathons spanning the globe from Los Angeles to Berlin Germany, London England, Rome, Italy, and Tokyo Japan just to name a few.
Coaching Career & Philosophy
Mark is a Boston and New York qualifier, an Abbott World Marathon Majors finisher, an RRCA Endurance and USATF Certified Coach. He is the LA Road Runners program administrator and head coach, where he oversees the largest marathon training program on the West Coast. He is a board member with the South Bay Runners Club and coaches both track and marathon training sessions. His goal over the course of his running career has been to inspire other athletes. This is what first brought him to coaching.
He believes training is fifty percent physical and fifty percent mental, and that it is his job to define the objective of my runners, analyze their results and provide constructive feedback. As a coach, he provides the runner with his expertise by explaining the why with the goal of empowering the runner to train optimally. He tries to instill the power of belief, so when his runners are truly tested, they believe in their ability to accomplish their goal. He believes this approach will sustain them in their darkest moments when they want to quit, but won’t. The time and effort required to achieve such mental strength is immense, but truly rewarding. Steve Prefontaine said it the best, “To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift”.
SBRC Charter Member Since: 2014
Board Member Since: 2015
Years of Marathon Running: 8
Number of Marathons: 23
Number of Half Marathons: Too many to count
The Best Thing About SBRC: Allowing me the opportunity to inspire runners to achieve the unimaginable.
Favorite Running Quote: Because 26.3 would be crazy