36th Marine Corps Marathon

As the email I just sent detailed, our very own Emily Hurley ran one of the best races in our brief history, as she powered her way to a 10th place finish at yesterday's Marine Corps Marathon.  Her time of 2:56:53 is beyond impressive, and bettered her 3:01:43 from the Boston Marathon earlier this year. 

Emily was running inspired.  On each of her shoulders she paid tribute to two of the people who she was running to honor.  On one, her grandmother, who served in World War II as a Marine; the other, a high school friend who was killed in action earlier this year.  At mile 18, after being fairly quiet for a few miles, she let us know what the words were all about, and at that moment I knew she was going to have a strong finish.

1:27 at the half, she was clicking off 6:40-6:45 per mile all the way to mile 20, when the pace crept up towards 7:00.  And that's where the race gets really tough.  The final 10k are a grind, not so much in physical difficulty but mentally.  After crossing that terrible bridge into Virginia, you go out and back for a little while before the 2 mile shot into the finish along the highway, and, in the truest form of cruelty, a 200m straight shot uphill to the finish.

But Emily got it done, and we couldn't be more proud!  10th place at a race this big is a huge accomplishment.  To run a near 5 minute PR is even more impressive.  That now puts her 6th on our Top Ten Individual Marathon performance list for women.

This earned her the Purple Drink Athlete of the Week, no question!

A very special shout out to one of GRC's finest, Andy Chicken Tender Sovonick.  CTR was going to run with me for my long run, and ended up running 17 miles as we ran alongside Emily from Georgetown on.  Andy obviously had never met Emily, and what was even greater was when I dropped, at mile 20, he was going to just cross the bridge and call it a day - but instead he ran with Emily through mile 26.  A great display of sportsmanship earned him our KC Masterpiece Award for coming through in the clutch (easily).