Saturday, April 24, 2010

Scenes from the First Blue Ridge Marathon

The finish line presented an impressive scene.^

(To enlarge photos, doubleclick on them.)

My old buddie Gordie Zeigler crosses the finish line in an impressive time.^

A five man-woman team crosses the finish line ...^

... and indulges in a lot of high-fives.^

Journalist Brian Kelley crosses in 4:27:46.^

Medal-clad marathon finishers pose for photos (groupies? Naaaaaah).^

Beth Deel patrolled the downtown race route in an electric car.^

Bruce Bryan and Stephanie Koehler (background acting goofy) worked with John Carlin to make certain everybody who finished had his name announced.^

Daniel Barchi of Carilion Biomedical Institute approaches the finish line ...^

...crosses the finish line ...^

... and collapses into conversation with his wife.^

I hadn't intended to photograph the Blue Ridge Marathon today, but I wound up downtown just as runners started coming into the finish area and danged if I didn't get caught up in the excitement. Just happened to have my trusty Nikon with me and, ignoring the possibility of getting a ticket in a 30-minute parking zone, I stood and waited for my pal Rex Bowman to show up (see next post).

Meanwhile, quite a bit was going on and it was fun being there. Here's some of what I saw. (I did not take a photo of the tall bearded guy who handed me a printed sheet declaring his interest in peace. He got mad at me when I said, "I believe in peace, but if I take this from you it'll wind up in the landfill and I'll be polluting." He said, "Can you just read it." I said, "I don't have time." I thought he was going to deck me.)

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