Boston Serves as a Reminder of Why We Run

I'll never be fast enough to run the Boston Marathon.

It's a fact I accepted almost as soon as I picked up the crazy hobby of running four years ago. But every runner, no matter how slow, knows that Boston is the Holy Grail of races. I know fellow runner-friends who have trained for it. I know exactly how fast I'd have to run to qualify. And I follow the news about the event ever year.

In that respect, Monday's marathon was like any other.

On Saturday, following my completion of the Martian Marathon 10K here in Dearborn, I tried to explain to my boyfriend why we do it. That is, why runners pay ridiculously high fees so that we can train until our toes bleed (no, seriously) and wake up at 6 a.m. to spend our entire morning running in wind, rain, snow and freezing temperatures with the only reward for most of us being a T-shirt, a medal, and a lot of Facebook likes for our latest “I did it!” photo.

But there's so much more to running races than that.

There are the fast friends (no pun intended) you make out on the course. The joy when a spectator who has never met you cheers you on and assures you that yes, you are amazing. The awe at our body's ability to do things we never knew it could. Of course, the tremendous feeling of accomplishment at the end – no matter your time, or whether you did a 5K or a 50K.

And yeah, we like shiny medals.

In short, races are purely positive events where generally, nothing bad ever happens—especially not at the finish line.

Until it does.

I am sad for the lives lost and damaged in Boston. But also because the pain and terror of such an occurrence is the exact opposite of what races are about.

After September 11, 2001, our nation's attitude toward air travel changed dramatically. Caution and fear became a part of a happy trip to visit family, or go on vacation. The country was set on edge, and the effects linger 12 years later.

Michigan writer LZ Granderson pointed out in his post on CNN.com that Monday serves as a reminder that terrorism “can happen anywhere.”

“If April 15, 2013, was the day the Boston Marathon became a target for terrorism, then September 11, 2001, was the day we all were warned that it would be,” Granderson wrote.

Races are always open, public events. Security measures are in place, but still, thousands of people come and go – none of them subject to searches or ID checks.

What will this attack in Boston mean for future races – and for large, public, outdoor events as a whole?

And what will it mean for runners – both those who were there, and those of us who, hundreds or thousands of miles away, felt the reverberations of what had happened?

For certain, Boston will be on our minds the next time we run a race. But rather than a cloud darkening future races, I hope it serves as a reminder of why we run.

Though I'll probably never run Boston, I run enough to know the cleansing power of the sport. And while on race day, we run for the medals, on most days, we run for much different reasons. To escape stress. To regain clarity. To feel like even when everything else is chaotic, this is something we can control.

Physical wounds from this tragedy will slowly begin to heal. Boston—the city and the race—will heal. The people who witnessed the explosions will heal. And runners will do it the way they always do: one foot in front of the other.