Emotions run high in Boston
BOSTON — Mark Shipley broke down Monday when he called his wife, but he wasn't sure why.
The 38-year-old Cranberry Township resident had a lot of reasons to be happy after he had just finished his first Boston Marathon.
The 118th running of the race already was swelling with pride after the deadly bombings last year. Then an American won the men's race this year for the first time since 1983.
Meb Keflezighi, who was naturalized as a citizen in 1998 after fleeing from Eritrea three decades ago, won in 2 hours, 8 minutes and 37 seconds.
“I don't know if I'm more excited that I got to do this or that Meb won,” Shipley said he told his wife. “I went to a seminar (Sunday) that had all the Boston legends. ... Today was a perfect day to end that.”
Shipley, who has already qualified for next year's race, finished the race in 3 hours, 19 minutes and 6 seconds.
All the Butler County runners involved agreed this was a special year for the race. After last year's race ended with 264 people injured and three killed by bombs, Mars resident Larry Church, 62, who finished his third Boston Marathon Monday in 4 hours, 42 minutes and 19 seconds, saw the increase in the size of the crowd.
Officials estimated 1.2 million people turned out to support the runners.
Church's voice after the race was hoarse from all the yelling he did with the crowd during the race.“In certain spots you could tell,” Church said. “In the last two or three miles, they are always about 12 rows deep. Today there weren't too many spots that didn't have good-size crowds.”Having that support helped push Butler Township resident Jennifer Bole, 31, along the race route.Bole, who was running for the first time at Boston, finished in 3 hours, 53 minutes and 53 seconds.She said, “It's hard to describe; there was 26 miles of people on the side of the road. The energy was awesome. There were times I felt weak and ran to the side (of the road) and stuck my hand out. It gave me an extra push.”Church was trying to keep things slow. He ran with a friend, Linda Beck, as he has another marathon next week in Oklahoma City.Shipley said the high point was running through the Wellesley scream tunnel and seeing an amputee participating in the race.“I'm almost certain he was one of the ones that was effected in the bombing last year,” Shipley said. “It was also emotional passing the two bombing sites. All of the fans were thanking us and the runners were thanking the spectators. It was incredible.”
