The training began early for the Grandmas Marathon as I first hit Las Vegas for a half marathon on a family trip that my father-in-law, John, took us on. Here, I ran straight down “Las Vegas Strip”, a location that I never in my wildest dreams thought I’d ever run, and scored a personal record in December of 2010.
As Grandma’s Marathon drew closer and closer my father-in-law, John, continued to fight his bout with kidney cancer. He had started the decline in early May and we could all begin to see him fighting harder and harder as regular life began to get more difficult with each passing day. Anyone who knows John and has spent any time with him can tell you a couple of things about him. -First of all, he is a fighter until the end who will never give up. Next, he is a man who is all about family. As John continued his decline I decided about five weeks out that I would be running mile #25 for him as the last one (#26) is always for my wife and kids.
As the race kicked off on that chilly and damp June morning everything felt great in my body. I had a game plan coming into the race where I thought I would have a legitimate shot at hitting my mark of 3:30:00 if I stuck to it. The first few miles I really had to focus in on not moving out too fast and burning up precious fuel that I would need to carry me through those tough miles at the end of the race. I hit the groove about mile 5 and it seemed like the next twelve miles or so just cruised by and ticked off as my pace was perfect. The work began at about mile 22 as my calf muscles began to stiffen up a little, but I was still feeling very good.
Mile 23 brought pure happiness to me as my wife held a big sign up saying “Go Daddio” and was yelling at the top of her lungs. This gave me the extra boost and I knew at this point the race was mine if I could just hang tough mentally. The next mile brought us through the cobblestones of downtown Duluth where we would hang a hard left followed by a right. As I turned into mile 25 the wind blasted straight into me out of the northeast at about 15 mph. This mile was for John and he would have it absolutely no other way. –I could hear him yelling to push on in my mind and under no circumstances would I let him down. I put my head down and bulled straight into the wind. So many thoughts ran through my head that mile and my eyes welled. I managed to keep an even 8:00 pace even running straight into the wind on mile 25 that day and kicked it down a bit more for the last mile once the course turned again and the wind was at my side as the finish line approached.
As I crossed the finish line a certain euphoria lifted me and I had made my time as I officially clocked in at 3 hours and 29 minutes. Twenty-three days later, in the early hours of the morning of July 11, 2011 the wind picked up once again and a huge thunderstorm came through. This thunderstorm was John leaving us and moving on with God’s hand on his shoulder.
Thanks for the values you taught me and the memories we shared, John. Mile 25 will always be yours.
