One of the great feelings after finishing a marathon or half marathon is going through the food area just past the finishing line and finding all kinds of delicious things to stuff in your starving face.

But before you get there, there’s a person handing out medals to all the finishers, something you can dangle around your neck to show everyone you survived the ordeal.  Some of them are pretty cool looking, others are a little lame, but I put them on display just the same.

I was shocked to read in the latest issue of Runner’s World that according to respondents in their poll, only 29 percent kept their finisher’s medals, and just 16 percent held onto age group and other awards. (For those who aren’t familiar, races often give prizes to the overall winners as well as to the top finisher’s in sub-categories like Men Age 20-24.)

Now I’m not wearing my medals around to social events, but I certainly would never just throw them away.  I keep them on top of my dresser, right next to my running watches and keys where I’ll see them before every time I go out for a run.

My collection is pretty varied.  In the back, there’s a trophy showing that in 2006 I came in first place in my age group in a 5K.  I especially like that one as a sign of humility since that was by far my worst 5K time ever, and I only came in first place because I was the only one in my age group who entered the race.

That same year I was on a little bit of a quest to win more age group awards, so I tried to cherry-pick smaller races where my chances might be a little better.  Didn’t quite work out as I planned, but I do have a nice 3rd place medal from the Vienna Elementary 5K.

The rest are more legitimate — 2nd place in my age group from the much more contested Herndon Festival 5K (a personal best at the time), then the string of medals from my five half marathons and one full marathon.

By far the coolest one is from the 26.2 with Donna Half Marathon — not confusing at all — which I did in 2009 just weeks after returning to running from a stress fracture.  It’s the one in the middle here:

My newest one is on the right.  I’m not going to lie, it’s the ugliest one, but then again the race was sponsored by McDonald’s so I’m not sure we should expect more.