I wanted to report to you about my first marathon (at age 52). While you [and other Reston Runners] were getting drenched at the Sallie Mae [and our regular Sunday run], I was getting drenched in New Jersey. In driving rain and headwinds of up to 19 mph, I ran my first marathon! 18 miles of the race were into the headwind. In spite of the adverse conditions, I accomplished three things:

1. I finished!!!
2. I got second place for my age/gender group!
3. I needed 4:00:00 to qualify to run the Boston Marathon, and I finished in 3:59:56.4!!!!! I qualified by a mere 3.6 seconds! When I could see the clock at the finish line, I saw that I had only 10 seconds left, so I had to sprint it in!!!

Oh, and I got a PR, since it was my first :-) I first wanted to run a marathon 32 years ago while I was in college, but for 30+ years, I forgot my dream. At age 51, I was a computer potato, but I woke up early one morning and ran to the street corner in the dark, huffing and puffing and gasping for water. Eighteen months later, last Sunday morning, I ran that long-awaited marathon, so it was a very sweet day. In the changing tent, I said out loud, "That was the best day of my life." I thought about other wonderful days after that, but in that moment, it surely was!

Thanks for all the support, encouragement, and advice from so many Reston Runners along the way. Thanks to my coach, Chuck Moeser, and all my buddies in RSL (Running as a Second Language), for being great running companions and for teaching me so many things about running over the last four months. And thanks to my brother, John, whose spirit accompanied me for the last 6.2 miles. Lynn Salvo

I would like others to know that age 51 is not too late to start a  new sport! Another thought: I started too late to learn from my own mistakes, so I had  to gather the collective wisdom and experience of lots of veteran runners and  really listen to it. Also, I didn't have limiting beliefs about what I could  or could not accomplish, and I am pretty sure that helped.  A tidbit that I forgot to mention: In high school, I ran the 600 meter run  for the Presidential Fitness Tests. It was the fastest time for my whole  school, but when the teacher looked at the stop watch, she simply said,  "Stopwatch error." At the time, I didn't protest or ask to run it again. I  just accepted it. But a little piece of me just never let go of a doubt:   "And what if it wasn't a stopwatch error?" So I've also been running to come  to terms with that moment in my life.

Lynn Salvo