Duluth, Minnesota #4

Duluth, Minnesota #3

Duluth, Minnesota #2

Duluth, Minnesota #1

Dick Beardsley & Gerda #3

Dick Beardsley & Gerda #2

Dick Beardsley & Gerda #1

Grandma’s Marathon
Duluth, Minnesota
Saturday, June 16, 2007

I traveled to Duluth, Minnesota to race walk Grandma’s Marathon on Saturday, June 16, 2007. The event and the associated Garry Bjorklund Half Marathon are extremely well organized and very famous races which attract the best of the world class marathoners. Because the day was very hot for Minnesota, the winning time was somewhat ‘slow’, 2:15:55. The tenth place time was 2:21:43 and 33 runners were under 2:30. These were very impressive times for being ‘slow’. The race was a point to point race that went parallel to Lake Superior. Normally the temperature of the lake keeps the air temperature ideal for a race; however, since there was no breeze, the temperature ended in the 80’s. The race was extremely well organized with plenty of enthusiastic volunteers. The course was completely close to automobile traffic. This is viewed by the city of Duluth as a major tourist event and it attracted runners from every state and over 30 countries. Every motel and hotel is booked solid ahead of time. Unfortunately the price of rooms doubled from their usual prices.
The race director is Dick Beardsley who won the 1982 Boston Marathon in a time of 2:08:53. My wife, Gerda, knows Dick from a running camp she attended in 1987. She brought a signed picture from 1987, which he had given her, and showed it to him. He was thrilled to see it and signed the back for her. His friend kidded him about how much he aged.
I had a great weekend at the race even though I had to slow down significantly after mile 21 because I was becoming too dehydrated and hot.

I will post pictures from My journey on a later posting.