Marcia laminated this section of the newspaper and mailed it to me!

I stood in the median of the street looking like a bum as David turned in the drive behind my parents’ house.  Marcia waited in the car, while David and I picked up our packets and walked around the vendors.  We warmed up back to the corrals and waited our turn to start the marathon, which was different from any other marathon I had run.  My strategy was simply to run even at 6:30 pace the entire race and finish in 2:50.  The park exit was around 15k, and I felt relaxed running through in 1:02.  I ate a GU as I approached the mile 10 water station, 1:05:41 into the race.  There was an awkward U-turn on 4^th Street that made us run 100 meters down then 100 meters back.  I crossed 30k right on pace in 2:01:46.  The half marathon walkers (on their 7^th mile) cheered me on from across the street expressing their awe at the speed in which I gracefully ran.  I walked back down to see David finish in 3:12:28, an exceptional time for a first go around.  Back home, silly Morgan sent David and me cheer texts while we were racing.  Beale Street is a scaled version of New Orleans’ Bourbon Street.

My family ordered me a trophy.

Follow this link for the full report.

Memphis 2011