Because we're so close to each other in pace, we decided I would run the second half of Boston with him and he would have another guide for the first. It would be too hard to guide him and set a marathon PR at the same time. Training was going extremely well early on, and a 3:30 was the goal. So Dan recruited his friend Charles Scott to run the first half, and soon decided his team from Rim to Rim to Rim should be at Boston too. See Team See Possibilities for more information on their fundraising adventures!
On Saturday I arrived in Boston too late to see most dailymilers at the meetup, but Ann and Norman were still there, and it was so nice to hang out with them for a little bit! Norman would go on to completely nail his goal and run a 2:38(!). Sunday was the MOST beautiful, perfect weather... but the marathon is on Monday. Low 40's, rain (at times heavy), and headwinds. Not exactly PR weather, so it was really exciting to see how many people crushed their goals! Dan had an unfortunate and slow healing heel injury for a lot of training, so the weather was more of a bummer than something to be stressed about. On Monday morning, he, Brad, and Charles got their trash bags on and headed to the start, where Team With a Vision had a place to stay inside, nice and warm and dry, before the Wave 3, 10:50am start.
After handing the tether off to Alison, Brad and I started running in front to "part the seas" if you will. I picked up trash bags that people had ditched in the middle of the course, fearing they would trip up Dan. Brad would let people know there was a blind running coming and we would help clear the way for Dan. He passed so many people in the last 10k!
The crowds in the last 10k- wow. I was one of the unfortunates who qualified for Boston, but not by enough to get in this year. I had always just wanted to be a qualifier- I didn't really care too much about actually running Boston. That all changed this marathon Monday. I could NOT believe the crowd support! It was raining, windy, cold, and yet that didn't stop thousands of people from lining the course to give out high-fives, scream their faces off, and hold up signs like "Hurry, the Kenyans are drinking your beer!" I definitely received a ton of high fives and tried to get the crowd pumped up to cheer for Dan. I'm pretty sure these next pictures sum up how the finish down Boyleston felt with all those screaming people- what a rush!