When I blog, I am usually talking about races that I've run. Today, I want to write about one of my long time running friends, my brother-in-law, Dale. He is married to my wife's sister and we have been running when we together since we met over 26 years ago. We ran the Pittsburgh marathon together in 1992 and have run races in Florida, Pennsylvania, Central Park, New Orleans, New Jersey and Washington, DC. He was been there for me when I did Bob's 40@40 and ran a bunch of races during my recent 50@50.
His real sporting passion is hockey and still laces up the skates at 55. His running always takes a backseat to his ice time, but still manages to run good times. He doesn't train as much for running, but always competes for top three in his age group, but had never placed.
Two years ago he was ecstatic when the Bob's 50@50 team took first place in the Master's category at the Jersey Shore Relay Marathon. It was his first running award of any kind and we repeated in 2010 much to his delight.
When he lived in Pittsburgh, he had a picture on his wall of himself and a few friends from a race in Florida. To me the picture was very inspirational because you could see that they worked hard at the race, but also enjoyed the company of his friends. I have been taking group running photos ever since.
His recent move to the hills of Georgia had me searching for races to run with him when we visit in the near future.
His wife Jo sent me a text late Saturday morning that he had run his first race in Ellijay and he came in first place in his age group. I know he had to be so excited to get the first individual age group win and to run a solid 24:04. Congrats Dale and I hope we can both place in a race when I get come out and visit.
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