Whew, what a day!
Listening to it rain all night, we were gearing ourselves up for a worst case scenario. But, as morning dawned, the sun broke through the mist in all its splendor, and stayed that way until long after the run was over!
All four of us ran very well, and between the first three runners (Shanti, Carrie, and Tina), they shaved a solid 30 minutes off of their collective run time! I was the 4th leg and I only showed up with about five minutes to spare, instead of the 30 I had planned for!
Last year, I ran the 3rd leg. This year running the last leg opened my eyes to how hard running a marathon is. There were many people who were finishing strong, but there were also many people who were really struggling. I even saw a fair amount of puking…the not so glamorous side of running…
There were some wonderful highlights.
I ran by a group of about eight girls, all around ages 8 or 9. I slowed down and made sure I “high-fived” them all before moving on….
I saw a three generation family of men running the marathon together…
I saw a woman running the marathon. At different intervals, a friend would come out of the crowd and run alongside her, cheering her on and saying encouraging words nonstop for about a half mile, then another friend would take over. I witnessed three exchanges before she was far enough ahead of me that I could not see her.
Post run with Tina..
At the celebratory brunch at Paul Martins after…
Shanti, Tina, Carrie, Me
