I got to Boston on Wednesday before race-day, to hang out with my 21yo and reconnect with friends that I hadn’t seen in decades. The weather was unusually warm for April, in the mid-80’s, but supposedly cooling down on race day. 🤞🏽When I qualified for the marathon, I was so fixated on the qualifying time that I didn’t really (fully) know the history of Boston as well as the fact that it’s 30,000 runners! LA marathon, that I ran a few weeks ago, was just 16,000 runners.

I had a place an AirBnb in Malden and on Thursday went for a run looking to get to the Mystic River – love running along the pathways here. But just hit a bunch of deadends, railroad crossings, fenced roads, and by the time I worked my way to the river, decided to turn back so as not burn too many miles.

Had much better luck on Friday as I found a gorgeous route heading up to the Middlesex Fells reservoir. Kinda crazy how many of these ponds and trails exist all over greater Boston, not to mention the bike trails that crisscross the area.

Boston Marathon: Expo

I met up with Rohit Sarathy at the expo, who had qualified at the Eugene Marathon with a blistering 2:51 finish! When I attempted to qualify, he was a huge help in pointing me at various training plans, speed workouts and always a cheerleader during & after the whole process. We caught up over lunch and all around you could feel the buzz in the city.

Briefly caught up with buddy Rajesh, who I hadn’t seen in decades! He was volunteering at the bib distribution.

We didn’t spend a whole lot of time exploring the expo as I remembered that Meb Keflezighi was going to be doing a live panel at Copley Square. We definitely wanted to see the legend in person! What still blows my mind when Meb won Boston in 2014 was that, at 38 years old, he ran a 4:56 split at mile 23 to build a 20 second lead going into the finish. I think I can run, maybe, run 400 meters at the pace! Super cool to see and listen to him talk.

As I write this blog on Sunday, the weather’s looking pretty perfect, overcast, moderate temperatures and a chance of sprinkle in the afternoon. Should be an amazing race day!