Big Sur Marathon Sweepstakes Contest From Earthbound Farm

This post originally started as administrative notes before a product review, but as often happens around here, I got a little bit carried away with things - so I’m splitting up the announcements and the review into separate posts. For today’s installment, I’ll just lay things out in bullet points …

* If you haven’t already done so, you’ve got a couple more days to enter the New Balance Minimus Trail giveaway contest, where the winner will be announced this weekend. Remember, you can’t win if you don’t play!

* A nice review of my Running Life book was recently published on the website of Chris Cooper, who is a like-minded author and blogger with a similar writing resume as mine. We set this up as a quid pro quo, so I’ll be posting a review of his book as soon as I finish it, hopefully in the next few weeks. In the meantime, check out his review of The Running Life, which has a link to our Amazon page – but remember that the book is cheaper from our own website and is also available in Kindle format if that’s your thing.

* It doesn’t often happen that I get two separate press releases about the same topic on the same day, but that’s exactly what happened this week – and the subject definitely grabbed my attention as something worth passing along, perhaps because it involves a couple of strong local connections for me.

My hometown of Carmel Valley is also the home of Earthbound Farm, which has become one of the largest organic growers in the world. They’ve also been a longtime supporter of the Big Sur International Marathon, and this year they’re giving away an amazing opportunity for two lucky runners.

Here are the details: between now and March 15, go to the company’s Facebook page and do the "like" thing, then take a very short Healthy Lifestyle quiz to be entered in the sweepstakes. I took the quiz, which only has 4 questions and takes about one minute to complete.

In exchange, here’s what you might get: the grand prize winner will receive two guaranteed entries to the Big Sur Marathon (which is your only way in, since registration sold out a few months ago), as well as roundtrip airfare for two to Monterey, lodging at the Portola Hotel & Spa right on the harbor, a post-marathon spa treatment for two, a new iPod Touch, and $500 cash for post-race shopping and dining. Total retail value of the package is $4,500, which is a pretty sweet return on investment for doing one measly Facebook survey.

Bixby Bridge - halfway point of the Big Sur International Marathon

The prize offer was so impressive that I took the quiz myself, even though I have no intention of running Big Sur this year (I’ll probably do the 5K with my daughter instead); I’m pretty much just in it for the iPod. So here’s my deal with you: if I happen to win this contest somehow, I’ll gladly give away the entire package to one of my readers, with the condition that you let me keep the music player. Sound good? OK then - go here to enter.

And if you’re relatively new to this website and want a first-hand account of why the Big Sur Marathon is so magnificent and why it holds such a special place in my heart, check out my race report from 2 years ago, complete with photos and video. And if you miss out on Big Sur this year, be sure to put it on your marathon bucket list; it’s truly one of the great ones.

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