What is this blurry pre-dawn scene we’re coming into?
Why, it’s the Baltimore Marathon!!!
And Kelli’s family has come out to support her.
With less than 10 minutes to go, it’s time to take the off warm-up gear off.
Mike has the Maryland flag on a telescoping pole so Kelli can easily find us on the sidelines.
Can you spot Kelli and Mike walking to the starting line?
This is the course they had to run.
So We all piled into my car, and drove to meet Kelli at our first stop….
And who did we find before Kelli…Dennis Albright!
There’s Kelli and Mike now. Mile 4 and looking good! (That’s Brian Shadrick’s work in the background)
We then jumped back into the car, and raced to the next stop.
Here they are at mile 6 after a long series of hills. They still look pretty fresh!
Walking back to the car, Kristi was feeling lighter than air!
This was a tricky one. We had to get over to the south side of the Hanover street bridge without getting caught in the traffic from the marathon.
Making the turn at mile 11. I put “KEL” on her shirt so people would cheer for her as she ran.
Now over to the south side of Federal Hill.
Ok, for being almost halfway done, they look way too happy.
This next stop we almost missed them.
They came through the Harbor Place area about 30 seconds after we got there.
Racing down to Canton, we thought that Brian Shadrick was going to come out and run a couple of miles with them.
He, however, did not get there in time, and missed them.
But while we were making time to the next stop, Brian was running as fast as he could to catch up to them.
His efforts paid off!! He (and Mike’s brother Dave) caught them around mile 16.
Their efforts were paying off too. I think they got a days worth of exercise they way I ran them around town.
Brian was gone by the next stop, but….
Dave ran the with them to the finish.
This stop was near the last big hill they had to climb for the day.
While most, and I do mean most, people at this point were walking up the hill, Kelli and Mike were running and smiling.
From here, it was down to the finish.
Kelli and Mike finished in just over 5 hours. Her pace was 11:36 per mile.
So happy to be done!!!!!
Look at the cool medal she’s wearing!!
We ran into Dennis at the post party race, so we did congrads all the way around with him.
Cheers, and congratulations to Kelli and Mike for running a great race!!!!