I Flew to California to Buy My Wife a Porsche… Then Ran Marathon #128
Distance: Marathon
Race Name: Camarillo Marathon
The Sales Freak Presents
ARE YOU A FREAK ABOUT RUNNING?
Marathons. Half marathons. 5Ks. Trails. Ultras. Training. Shoes. Gear. Coaches. Clubs. Travel. Medals. Creators. Businesses. Recovery. Stories.
My wife and I have spent years running marathons, traveling to races and collecting more stories than I could ever fit into a social feed. So I built Runner Freak as the Freak Sites Island where I can wander into everything running, create the content I want to create and use those Parking Spots to promote my own brands.
🔎 SEARCH THE ISLAND
Search a race, runner, city, coach, club, product, service, story or keyword and find the Parking Spots around it.
RECENTLY PARKED
Races, running stories, gear, businesses, trips, opinions, old memories, new discoveries and whatever else I found interesting enough to give its own Parking Spot.
The Original San Diego Marathon — 18 Years Later I Came Back For Round Three
Distance: Marathon
Race Name: San Diego Marathon
The Albuquerque Marathon — I Knew I Didn’t Train Enough… And Ran It Anyway
Distance: Marathon
Race Name: The Albuquerque Marathon – Run Fit
The Alamo Marathon — Sun, Humidity, Sandals, and Blisters
Distance: Marathon
Race Name: The Alamo Marathon
😂 RUNNING WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE CHEAP SPORT.
Put on some shoes. Walk out the front door. Start running.
That sounds cheap. Then runners get involved.
First you need better shoes. Then a GPS watch. Race entries. Technical shirts. Shorts. Nutrition. Recovery stuff. Maybe a coach. Maybe another pair of shoes because apparently the first pair is only for certain kinds of running.
Then somebody says:
“YOU SHOULD RUN THIS MARATHON. IT’S AWESOME.”
Great. Now add airfare, a hotel, rental car, restaurants, race fees and a weekend away.
For two people, a destination-race weekend can pretty easily become a $1,500–$2,000 little vacation where the main attraction is waking up before sunrise to run 26.2 miles.
At $1,500–$2,000 for two people, 100 destination-race weekends is roughly $150,000–$200,000 around a sport that started with:
“JUST GO OUTSIDE AND RUN.”
My wife and I have probably spent somewhere in that neighborhood over the years.
That’s not just exercise anymore. That’s an economy.
And the shoe business alone cracks me up. When I ran my first half marathon back around 2001 or 2002, try selling the average runner a $300 pair of shoes and see how long it took before somebody laughed at you.
Now HOKA has managed to create the running shoe that people wear to “run” from Accounting to Human Resources.
RUNNING GOT WEIRD.
I LOVE IT. 😂
If you’re currently struggling through your first mile, this may be your last chance to escape.
There’s still time to escape to the weight room or the pickleball court. 😂
⭐ THERE ARE REALLY THREE THINGS THAT MAKE THIS WORLD INTERESTING
🏁 THE RACES
Marathons. Half marathons. 5Ks. Ultras. Trails. Relays. Destination races. Tiny local events. Giant city races. Courses you never forget and races that disappear completely. Every start line has its own little world.
👟 THE BUSINESS
Shoes. Watches. Stores. Coaches. Race directors. Timing companies. Hotels. Airlines. Nutrition. Recovery. Brands. Sponsors. Creators. Charities. Running may be simple. The world built around runners definitely isn’t.
📖 THE STORIES
First races. Personal records. Injuries. Comebacks. Bad hotels. Great trips. Wrong turns. Lost toenails. Finish lines. Medals. Friends. Places you never would have visited if somebody hadn’t put a race there. That’s where the good stuff lives.
THE FINISH LINE IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.
LOOK AT EVERYTHING AROUND IT.
🌴 THE RUNNER FREAK ISLAND
The running world is enormous, so I need enough room to wander around without turning the Island into one giant mess.
Here’s where things currently park:
🏁 Races & Running Events
Marathons, half marathons, 5Ks, 10Ks, trail races, ultras, relays and other events.
🏃 Training Programs & Coaching
Coaches, training plans, group runs, clubs and running communities.
👟 Gear, Shoes & Products
Shoes, apparel, watches, nutrition, products, reviews and running gear.
🛠️ Services & Recovery
Running stores, recovery professionals, photographers and other services built around runners.
🎥 Creators & Storytellers
Videos, podcasts, race reports, opinions, milestones, memories and people creating running content.
💡 Trips, Charities & Creative Ideas
Running travel, fundraisers, charity teams, sponsorship ideas, volunteer opportunities and things that don’t fit neatly anywhere else.
Some of what gets parked here is mine. Some may belong to other people playing on the Island with me.
Either way, it gives me plenty to talk about.
THIS ISN’T JUST A RACE CALENDAR OR A CLASSIFIED SITE FOR RUNNERS.
Although, yes, you can absolutely park a race, product, service or running business here too.
Runner Freak was built on the mechanics of a listing site, so a Parking Spot can be used to promote a race, runner, coach, club, store, shoe, product, service, sponsor, fundraiser or running trip.
That’s useful. It’s just nowhere close to the whole running world.
A first marathon. A personal record. A terrible race. A great trip. An injury. A comeback. A shoe review. A race that disappeared. A bizarre discovery. A story somebody else might actually want to find years later.
If the connection to running, races, training, gear, travel, businesses, services or the stories around them makes sense, there’s probably a place for it here.
🔎 I WANTED ONE PLACE TO FIND MY OWN RUNNING STUFF AGAIN.
Running is a massive market, and I can create a lot of content around it. Why not? Races, travel, shoes, gear, coaching, recovery, sponsors, businesses and stories give me plenty to work with. So I built an Island around everything running.
Marathons. Half marathons. Race trips. Shoes. Training. Gear. Businesses. Sponsors. Old races. New races. Stories. Commentary.
Some of those Parking Spots may point people toward CoolCarGuy.com, Freak Sites, my Sales Freak account or something else I’m building.
Some are simply races, memories or subjects I wanted to explore.
And running gives me a pretty good reason to want my own searchable archive.
SOME OF THE RACES I RAN DON’T EVEN EXIST ANYMORE.
My first half marathon was the Georgetown to Idaho Springs Half Marathon in Colorado. I ran it around 2001 or 2002 and then ran it three years in a row.
The race still exists. The old results are another story.
I ran the Denver Marathon multiple times. That race is gone.
I ran the American Discovery Trail Marathon ten times. That race is gone.
I ran the Mount Sneffels Marathon in Ouray, Colorado. That race is gone.
THE RACE HAPPENED.
THE INTERNET ISN’T OBLIGATED TO REMEMBER IT.
I’ve run 128 full marathons and counting. That’s a lot of races, photographs, medals, cities, people and stories.
Months later—or twenty years later—I don’t want to remember which race website, social feed, timing-company archive, phone or random folder something ended up in.
I want to remember one thing.
THE KEYWORD.
Somebody brings up a race or running subject and I think:
“I ALREADY WROTE ABOUT THIS.”
I don’t start digging through old websites or scrolling through old posts.
I come back to Runner Freak and type what I remember.
GEORGETOWN. DENVER. AMERICAN DISCOVERY TRAIL. OURAY.
BAM. THERE’S THE PARKING SPOT.
Maybe I want to read it again.
Maybe something changed and I want to update it.
Maybe somebody asks about the race and I already did the work.
Copy the link. Send it. Have a nice day.
A social post gets a timestamp.
A Parking Spot gets an address.
That’s what I wanted.
A searchable Island built around everything running, where the content I create doesn’t disappear just because a feed moved on or a race website did.
Remember the subject. Search the Island. Find the Parking Spot.
YOU ALREADY RAN THE RACE. YOU TOOK THE PHOTOS.
WHY NOT GIVE THE STORY AN ADDRESS?
🏖️ WANT TO STICK AN UMBRELLA ON MY BEACH?
I built Runner Freak because I wanted somewhere to park my own running world.
I’m already doing exactly what the Parking Spot is designed to do: creating content around something that interests me and using that content to promote my own brands. I’m going to keep doing it whether anybody else joins me or not.
If that makes you think, “Why wouldn’t I do the same thing for my business, brand, project or idea?” — that’s the point.
And it’s a pretty big Island.
If you’ve got a race story, a running business, a club, a product, a video, a coaching service, a race, a fundraiser, a trip, a milestone or something else that genuinely belongs here, grab a spot.
Leave $7 in the Parking Spot box and stick your umbrella in the sand.
That’s one Parking Spot. Got another running story? Leave another seven bucks in the box and grab another spot.
THE METER DOESN’T KEEP RUNNING.
It’s a one-time Island pass for that Parking Spot. No subscription. No scheduled renewal. No scheduled expiration.
You get the same basic Parking Spot tools I use:
- Up to 25 photos
- Up to two supported embedded videos
- Up to 30,000 characters for writing
- No 280-character post limit here
- Your own dedicated URL
- Links, contact information and calls to action
- A public view counter
- A place inside the searchable Runner Freak Island
- Already posted the story on Facebook?
- Already made the YouTube video?
- Got 40 race photographs sitting on your phone?
- Worried your race website may eventually disappear just like some of mine did?
Cool. Give one piece of it another place to work.
If it sounds useful, have at it. If not, keep looking around.
I’ll still be here creating more stuff.
WANT TO PUSH ONE PARKING SPOT FURTHER?
The standard $7 Parking Spot is the starting point. There are also optional one-time upgrades when they make sense:
- Video Spotlight — $99
A finished 3–5 minute video I approve for publication through the @FreakSites channels on YouTube and Rumble and link back to a Parking Spot. - StoryDrive™ 1000 — $299
Add 1,000 additional recorded views to a Parking Spot.
And if you don’t need a Parking Spot yourself, you can still join the Affiliate Program for free and get paid for brokering Runner Freak advertising to people who do.
ONE PARKING SPOT OR A WHOLE GARAGE. YOUR CALL.
Every Parking Spot connects to your profile. Create another one and it connects there too. Keep going and those Parking Spots start collecting inside your own Runner Freak Garage.
Keep going after that and your Garage can start looking a lot like your own Channel inside the Island — your races, photographs, videos, stories, business, coaching, products, trips or whatever else you keep parking.
A runner might build twenty years of race history. A race director might document events. A coach might build a library around training. A club might collect its runs and stories. A creator might give every video a deeper page with photographs, links and the rest of the story.
You don’t need to build a Garage or a Channel.
But you can.
🛠️ YOU’LL PROBABLY HAVE TO FIGURE A FEW THINGS OUT.
RunnerFreak.com is not a giant software company with a call center and a team waiting to build your page for you.
I built the system. I use it myself.
There are instructions around the Island to help you understand how it works.
If you can create your own Parking Spot, have at it.
If you decide it isn’t your thing, no problem.
Enjoy the content.
I’ll still be here running around and building stuff.
💰 AND YES — YOU CAN BROKER THE ADVERTISING TOO.
Running worked its way into my business life a long time ago, which is another reason Runner Freak makes sense to me.
At one point I was running marathons with CoolCarGuy.com on my shirt and letting my own car business sponsor me.
I even convinced Becky and a running buddy to wear CoolCarGuy.com shirts during a marathon. I supplied the free shirts. 😂
Once you start looking at running as attention, travel, events, audiences and communities, sponsorship suddenly isn’t that weird at all.
So if you help me create a paying customer for Runner Freak advertising, I think you should be able to get paid for helping create that business.
I’m not paying you a piece of somebody else’s race entry, shoe sale, coaching fee, running-store purchase or sponsorship deal. That’s their business. I’m paying affiliates for selling Runner Freak advertising.
The Runner Freak Affiliate Program is free to apply for. I approve the affiliates. It’s not going to a committee — just me.
Once you’re approved, you get your affiliate link.
SHARE THE LINK.
SOMEBODY CLICKS IT AND BUYS.
YOU GET PAID.
The direct commission is 20%.
Your customer comes back later and buys something else?
You can get paid again.
ONE COMMISSION IS A TRANSACTION.
A BOOK OF CUSTOMERS IS A BUSINESS.
Want to keep it direct?
Great. Find customers and take the 20%.
Want to build a network too?
20% → 15% → 10% → 5% → 5%
No need to recruit 26.2 affiliates before anything happens. 😂
You don’t get paid for joining. You don’t get paid just because somebody becomes an affiliate.
The advertising has to sell.
I BUILT THE ADVERTISING.
YOU CAN BROKER IT IF YOU WANT TO.
🏅 RUNNER TALK
Races. Travel. Shoes. Training. Old memories. New stupidity. Great runs. Bad decisions. Businesses. Sponsors. Finish lines. And whatever else catches my attention around running.
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I BUILT THE ISLAND.
YOU’RE WELCOME TO GRAB A SPOT.
Read the stories. Search the races. Watch what gets built. See what people park here.
And if you want to grab a spot on Runner Freak, that’s what the Parking Spot is for.
Illustrations and examples are provided for educational, explanatory and editorial storytelling purposes.