BOSTON QUALIFIED Race Report for the Long Beach Marathon I ran today (10/6/24). My "A" goal was to run this race fast enough to guarantee an entry in the 2026 Boston Marathon so I could run it with Callie Andra Pfaff, my daughter. That has been on our bucket list since pretty much the time we started running marathons almost 10 years ago. It looks like that is finally going to be a reality. We have run, probably, 25 marathons between us, actually qualified and we're entered to run Boston in '20 but it got canceled that year due to COVID. We are both very excited to achieve this goal again and hopefully finally run it together! I haven't run but one other marathon since 2020 so I was feeling pretty rusty about this race. Topped with the poor training cycle I had through the HOT and HUMID summer my confidence was low. I decided to start the first few miles slow and hopefully pick up the pace later in the race. At mile 5 I was running a 8:30 avg pace and at about mile 15-26 I had dropped to 8:25. I was about on pace to do what I wanted (and believed my body could do) but the hot and humid race day caught up with me as I leveled off between miles 17-22 and then really struggled from 23-26.2. I made a mental decision to back off and keep the possibility of the wheels falling off at 22 and dropped the pace quite a bit. Even with that said, I was 7th in my age category with a 3:46:24 finish time. This is almost 20 minutes faster than my required Boston qualifying time so I should.be.a shoe in when I apply for the '26 Boston! I had a great cheering squad with Callie, Sarah, Matt and even 16 days old Everett watching me at mile 16 and 20. I especially want to thank Callie for inspiring me to start running almost 15 years ago. It has been a great bond between us and really kept me in shape. (When I started running 15 years ago I was like most, thinking I was getting old, feeling all the knee, back and hip pains. Thinking there was no way for me to run...but I realized we are made to move! But this is a story for another time.) I JUST RUN | 