Learn Spanish (Latin America): Para el maratón, tienes que seguir corriendo. - For the marathon, you have to keep running.

When you want to express that an action is ongoing or that you keep doing something, you use seguir or continuar followed by the gerund (the -ando or -iendo form). Because of this rule, seguir corriendo means to keep running.

Why is seguir left in its infinitive form here?

It comes directly after tienes que (you have to). The phrase tener que must always be followed by an infinitive verb. Because the verbs stack up in this sentence, tienes is conjugated to match the subject, seguir stays in the infinitive, and corriendo takes the gerund form.

Could I use continuar instead of seguir in this sentence?

Yes, you could absolutely say tienes que continuar corriendo. Both verbs mean exactly the same thing in this context. In everyday Latin American Spanish, seguir is generally more common, while continuar can sound slightly more formal.

Why does the sentence start with Para el maratón instead of Por el maratón?