Don Conradi and company touch all the bases.

to travel the country: meeting real, down-to-earth people, experiencing great

natural occurrences, feeling on his skin the hot, dry heat of the desert or the biting cold of winter. The journey usually entails a large recreational vehicle of some sort and is decided upon in the latter stages of life as a way to reconnect. Oh, and there are always lots of maps involved. But that same adventuresome quest can also be experienced 26.2 miles at a time and may begin not necessarily as a senior or even as a master. Oh, and there are always lots of course maps involved.

For Don Conradi, an East Walpole, Massachusetts, resident with over 100 marathons to his credit, seeing each state in America was more of a personal hands-on—or for that matter, feet-on—expedition one marathon at a time until he had run a 42K in all 50 states. He thus became, at the age of 61, the 439th person recorded on the 50 States Marathon Club list and only the fifth one from the Bay State.

Interestingly, there were times that the journey to the journey provided an adventure all its own. A case in point for Conradi was the Mayor’s Midnight Sun Marathon in Anchorage, Alaska, which was his 11th state. Nine days before the race, while walking on a marble floor in an office building, he felt great pain when his oft-injured knee popped out of joint. He soon popped it back in, iced it, and then found himself on a pair of crutches.

“Tt swelled up a lot, and I really wasn’t sure what I was going to do. But I figured how many chances do you get to go to Alaska—I had used my airline mileage—so I decided to go anyway, even if I couldn’t run. The day before I left, I switched from crutches to a cane, and my first flight was from Boston to Washington, DC,” he said.

“In DC, it was getting real dark, and as it turned out, a tornado hit the airport and all the flights were delayed for hours. I knew I was going to miss my con-

| here is a certain nostalgic sense of romance whenever someone says he wants

necting flight to Seattle, so I talked to [the airline], and they said they have that taken care of because there’s a whole bunch of us that have that same connection.”

When Conradi arrived, he discovered the “other people” were all part of a charity running group to which the airline erroneously presumed he belonged. That group had chartered its own plane—for 30 people.

“Not 31 people,” he said with a chuckle. “It was after midnight, and I tried standby, unsuccessfully, so I got in line at the ticket counter at United that opened at 4:00 a.., and they told me the earliest they could get me there was in four days! So I went to Alaska Airlines and stood by on every flight I could and finally got a flight to Juneau, and then I got a fishing-shuttle airplane that made four stops but finally got me to Anchorage late in the afternoon.”

He was able to contact a friend who was also running, made his way to registration to change his division from runner to walker, and then walked the entire marathon with the aid of his cane.

“T was able to start an hour early, and there were a lot of people that weren’t that fast, like charity runners. And it was on the longest day of the year. And by the way, the sun doesn’t go down at all! They say it’s the Midnight Sun, but it’s also the three-in-the-morning sun [and so on], because I was up at all those times,” said Conradi, who averaged a 15:48-mile pace for a 6:54 finish. “It was an interesting course. A lot of it was through a military reservation, so you didn’t have to worry about cars. There was a lot of wildlife, and you could see the snowcapped mountains in the distance.”

In an ironic send-off, Conradi’s return flight home was delayed several hours. And nine days later, he underwent knee surgery to clean up loose cartilage and was told that he could never run again. This was in June 2000, with 39 more states to go for 50!

With family

Joining Conradi en route to running a marathon in each state—although not members of the 50 States Marathon Club—were his sister and her husband, Ellen and Fred Jacques of New Jersey. For support and camaraderie, all three would run the same marathon whenever possible. One of those nearly dozen races they were able to run together was the now-defunct Charlotte Observer Marathon in North Carolina. The joy of sharing the moment with family soon turned to the hardship of enduring the elements.

“Tt was held in January, but it was Charlotte, North Carolina, so we figured how bad could it be?” Conradi said. “Well, record cold! When the race started, it was about 10 [degrees]. I had run every other race in just shorts and a singlet or possibly a long-sleeve shirt. [But this time] I left all my warm stuff on—I had two pairs of gloves and a hat—but it wasn’t enough. The other problem was water.

Whenever any water got spilled, of course it froze immediately. And even trying to drink it, it froze on the top. So that was very difficult. And my hands froze up so bad I couldn’t even use my hands. The only way I could [lift] a cup was to use my wrists and tip it up [to drink]. And I remember asking some people watching the race to help me with my hat.”

Fred also points to additional challenges in Charlotte that left one member in the party on the disabled list.

“We ran our usual conservative pace at the beginning and were toward the back. At about three miles, we made an untimely pit stop. By the time we got back on the course, the trailing police car had passed, and now all the traffic was taking up the road, leaving us a small and very slanted running lane on the side. We had to run on this for a few miles before the course veered off the main road. But the damage had been done,” he said. “Ellen’s knee gave out at the 18-mile mark from the miles of slanted running. She was not able [to] even walk another step. Quite fortunately, we had to wait only a minute before a medical car came along. They quickly got Ellen in the car, and I continued on to the end. [After the race] Don and I did a tour of the Charlotte drugstores and bought a cane for Ellen for the trip back home.”

Don (4:22:06) and Fred (4:56:32) finished about half an hour apart. Ellen returned to Charlotte in 2008 to run all 26.2 miles with her husband, both finishing in 4:52:03.

In addition to facing the elements of the Tar Heel State together, Fred also recalls as memorable the warm connection of family in Vermont (Vermont City Marathon in Burlington) and South Carolina (Myrtle Beach Marathon).

“Vermont was really our first step outside of our local marathons on our 50-states goal,”

<4On the 10th anniversary of his first Boston Marathon, Don Conradi, along with his sister, Ellen Jacques, waits in the Athletes’ Village in Hopkinton prior to running the 103rd Boston in 1999.

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noted Fred, who, along with his wife, had by that time finished marathons in New York and Massachusetts, while Fred also had run New Jersey. “Vermont was on Memorial Day weekend, and it coincided with Ellen’s birthday. I had [at the time] recently read an article about the 50-state marathoners and cheerfully asked Ellen if she would like to run a marathon on her birthday. The request was not met with the enthusiasm I had hoped for. But once Don knew we might do it, he and his family made plans to go, too. So we had a family reunion/birthday celebration/marathon weekend. Don’s son, Jeff, who had never run more than a few miles, ran with Ellen for 18 miles!”

At the 2007 Myrtle Beach, joining the trio as a spectator was Don’s wife, Candy, who had incorporated into their time some local sightseeing adventures. But first was the marathon task at hand, which for some, as Fred pointed out, proved more difficult than usual.

“Ellen, recovering from an injury, was going to walk, and Don was going to half-walk, half-run. I had already done South Carolina so was going to run easy,” he said. “Two days before, there was a snowstorm in New Jersey where we live. After shoveling the snow, my back felt a bit achy, but I thought I could finish the marathon with the usual discomfort. Not so. By mile 14, I was walking/running. By 15, I was walking. By 16, walking like Quasimodo. Ellen, who walked 20 miles, ran the last 1OK and passed me around mile 23. Don had already finished for over an hour. I looked so bad, one runner looked at me and asked me if I was 70!” exclaimed Fred, who was 58 at the time. “I said, ‘No. Seventy-two.’ He said, ‘I knew it.’ But we all made it to the end. We went to an oldies concert that night and visited a historic house the next day, thanks to Candy’s arrangements. For one month after, I only walked. And in our next marathon, I walked half and ran half—the back needed a rest.”

Conradi finished Myrtle Beach in 5:17:16 with his sister at 5:50:33 and Fred in 6:29:48,

Heat

The year 2004 featured some hot races for Conradi in Louisiana (Mardi Gras Marathon in New Orleans), Georgia (Cherry Blossom Marathon in Macon), Delaware (Delaware Marathon in Wilmington), and once again in Massachusetts (the Boston Marathon).

“T was actually stationed in Gulfport, Mississippi, during Vietnam when I was in the Navy, and I know how hot and humid it can get in that area. It really can be brutal. [had a little bit of a hot-and-humid weather experience in New Orleans, but it wasn’t as hot as I thought it was going to be,” he said. “And what I remember most about the Georgia race was at the 16-mile mark, two people started yelling at me as I went by and told me to stop. And I did. They said I didn’t look good

and I should stop. I said I didn’t feel that bad, and I said, ‘What’s wrong?’ And they said, ‘Well, you’re sweating.’ They both said they were doctors, and they were concerned about me,” Conradi said with a shrug. “I ended up finishing the race, and actually it’s the only marathon I’ve ever got an age-group award in—I finished third in my age group.” His 4:19:51 was third of 84 finishers in the 55-59 age group and 103rd overall.

The following month, on Patriots’ Day in Massachusetts, Conradi faced one of the hottest Bostons on record when temperatures hovered in the high 80s. It reportedly caused a number of cases of hyponatremia, dehydration, and respiratory and heart problems, and a heart attack. Medical personnel treated nearly 1,200 people, which resulted in backups and waiting lines at nearby hospitals and emergency rooms.

“In 2004, the race started at noon if you’re in front—and later than that if you’re further back—and it was at least 90 when the race started. It was just a brutal race,” he said. “It was the first time—other than when I had my knee problem and I walked—that I had done one in over five hours. People all along the sides had hoses; even the fire department had hoses out. I finished, but it was pretty brutal.”

Delaware, which also featured hot temperatures on race day, was comprised of a four-lap course. “It’s basically four 10Ks all along the same course. And unfortunately, that one was almost as hot [as Boston],” he said.

The 2007 Twin Cities Marathon in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was held on the same hot October day as the notorious Chicago Marathon that was eventually stopped due to record heat that reportedly resulted in one death, hundreds of hospitalizations, and nearly 11,000 dropouts. Much to Conradi’s consternation, Twin Cities experienced similar weather.

“When I was running in Minneapolis, I knew it was hot, I knew it was bad, [so] I was going much slower than I could. They did have a six-hour sweep bus, so you had to watch for that. At about 19 miles, I just felt terrible, and they had run out of water so I went to the medical area, and they did give me some water and Gatorade, which I didn’t really keep down,” he said. “I did drop out of that one. That’s the only one I’ve ever dropped out of. It’s kind of disappointing—you pay the money, you go there, you do everything. Sometimes the weather’s just too hot. I know it was the right decision, but it was very disappointing to me for a long period of time.”

Physical toll

Halfway through the 50 states, Conradi experienced increased back pain. When the pain continued after the 2004 New York City Marathon, he decided to see his doctor, who said it was related to his hip. A few specialists later, and the bad news was confirmed. “I was told I had to have a total hip replacement. Both my

parents had arthritis. I’ve had arthritis before, in my hands and other parts, and I’ve got a lot of arthritis in my knee,” said Conradi, “and that’s basically what knocked out my hip.”

In the spring of 2005, he underwent hip surgery and was once again told he would never run again. This was five years and 14 states after the first time he was notified of such a fate. And it was around this time, with 25 different states under his belt, that he learned of a new goal.

“During this time I was convalescing at home, my Runner’s World arrived, and it had an article about the 50 States Marathon Club. I was very interested in that. One of the things that most intrigued me was one of the officers of the club said the club philosophy was to go out slow and then taper off. And I thought, Well, I can do that. So J actually joined the club while I was convalescing from my hip injury,” said Conradi, who was then 57. “I took classes on how to fast-walk, which they told me was OK, and I wanted to continue my running.”

His first state after the hip replacement was Iowa, at the Des Moines Marathon, in the fall of 2005. With a combination of running and walking, Conradi finished his 26th state in a time of 5:30:02.

“T started out walking, but I got frustrated and started running and ended up doing half walking and half running in that race. I finished, but I definitely paid for it for a couple of days later,” he said. “But I did get through it and basically considered myself back.”

Sidetrack

len was diagnosed with breast cancer. The news was received shortly after Don, Ellen, and Fred had run the North Dakota Roughrider Marathon in Bismarck, which was Conradi’s 36th state.

“Certainly, I was very concerned when I found out that my sister had cancer,” said Conradi. “However, I knew she was in great physical shape, and I was fully confident that she would recover and finish her 50-state goal. I continued to run my scheduled races with the hope that we would finish together. As it turned out, we finished only a few months apart.”

Ellen’s husband, who was also forced to deal with the shock of a cancer diagnosis for his beloved, found renewed hope and faith within the unwanted circumstances.

“At first, you go into denial. How can such a seemingly healthy person—exercising, eating right—become a cancer patient? Then the fear of the unknown comes in: will the treatment work; will the side effects be worse; will it be stopped before it spreads? But after you prayed and stopped worrying over the future, you begin to feel a peacelike acceptance that helps you to live each day as it is,”

Fred confided. “Whether going with Ellen to the chemo treatments, measuring the liquid that drained out of the arm after the surgery, feeling the pain of stretching her arm to break up the scar tissue, or holding her when she cried—each moment had an added dimension of sacredness that brought us closer together.”

Ellen used running as an integral part of her recovery, and within seven months, she was back to a level of fitness that allowed her to continue in a positive manner and become cancer free.

“Amazingly, I was able to go out and either walk or run just about every morning—including the morning after the surgery—and all through the chemo and the radiation treatments,” she said. “I didn’t run in any races at first, but once Thad finished the chemo and was about to start the radiation, I ran the women’s More Magazine Half-Marathon in early April 2008 in Central Park and was really excited that I finished close to my usual time for a half-marathon. I saw a few friends in the half and told them that I had just finished chemo. They were quite impressed. By the summer, we were back to our marathon training and ran a marathon in mid-August, then four more that year—getting faster with each one. That really did help with the recovery—to get back into the exercise routine.”

Extra variables

Before the 2006 Montana Marathon, a point-to-point course from the town of Molt to the state’s largest city of Billings, Conradi had been warned about wildfires that might cause the race to be canceled.

“Every day for a month before the race, I was getting e-mails about forest fires in the area [and] whether the race was going to be held or not. They finally said it was a go, so I flew out there, and the whole sky was dark. You couldn’t see fire, but it smelled terrible. You knew there was a forest fire somewhere close,” he said. “They bused us out to the start in the dark—somewhere in cattle country—so you really didn’t see what was around you until daylight.”

After daybreak, and around the time that welcome precipitation was cleaning the air and aiding the firefighters, Conradi reached a portion of the course with several obstacles. The previous miles had consisted of small roadways and unpopulated stretches, so he was excited about the open highway miles where he could stretch out and run. Or so he thought.

“When we finally got to a point where we went on an expressway, the speed limit was 75 miles an hour, and we were facing traffic, which of course is what you should always do as a runner. Next to the road was a shoulder about two feet wide with no rails and a 1,000-foot drop along there. And about every 200 yards was one of these [roadside] memorials set up with all the flowers and things,” he said. “Just as I started through there, the rain changed to sleet, and it was heavy, too, and it became more slippery. So we’ve got cars coming at us at 75 or more,

[a shoulder of] two feet, weaving around the memorials, and a thousand-foot drop. And [have a fear of heights anyway, so this was something I always remembered.”

He arrived at the Daylis Stadium finish near Pioneer Park in 5:24:14 to take care of state number 30. Nine states later, at the Red Rock Canyon Marathon in Nevada, there was another warning for the runners, albeit a bit more benign in nature.

“One of the first things they did was give us a form to sign because the area we were in was a protected area, and we had to sign a form that we wouldn’t injure one of the endangered species turtles that were in the area,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t think any of us saw a turtle the entire race, but at least we were careful not to damage any of those guys.”

For the 6:00 A.M. start, runners were subjected to the desert cold on the outskirts of Las Vegas while waiting for the buses.

“We left at four a.m. from Red Rock Resort and Casino, so I think I left about 2:30 in the morning from Caesars Palace to get there. Fortunately, I had fairly warm stuff to wear, but not everybody did, and some of the people were freezing,” he said. “And the course itself was the steepest course I’ve ever been on. It started at about 4,000 feet, peaked up to about 5,500, came back down to about 4,000 for the marathon, and then you turned around and came back. For the halfmarathoners, they took them to the other end and had them run directly toward us, and this was a fairly narrow area, in parts, with more of a trail-type situation. So for the first half of the race, not only did you have to climb the hills, you had to worry you didn’t have a head-on collision with people coming at you from the other direction,” chuckled Conradi, who finished in 5:49:17.

Full years

From his first marathon in 1985 (Chicago) to 2000, Conradi ran in just 11 different states. However, after 2000 he averaged nearly five states a year, and a peak of seven in 2008.

“Sometimes I tried to get two marathons out of one training,” he said. “It seemed to work.”

But his supportive wife initially questioned why he ran so much in such a short period of time. “I said I thought he was crazy when he started doing these back-to-back ones,” recalls Candy. “Then he told me that it wasn’t the races, it’s the training that’s killing him. So that made more sense. I could see that.”

Conradi also ran a few marathons more than once, such as the New York City Marathon 17 times, including 16 consecutive years from 1990 to 2005. Candy finally offered some sage advice.

“T convinced him to quit running New York for a while, because when he decided he was going to run all these marathons, I said, ‘Why do you keep running the same ones year after year?’ I said to concentrate on the other ones,” she noted.

Time to enjoy

Some marathons leave much to be desired, and Conradi ran them just to cross the state off his list. However, a number of races provided an enjoyable sensory overload. In 2009, there were two such 42Ks in the western half of the country— Hawaii and Colorado.

The Big Island International Marathon in Hawaii was run along lava beaches and past streaming waterfalls. “It was in Hilo, on the rainforest side of the Big Island, kind of opposite Kona, and it did rain,” he said. “I think they get 160 inches of rain a year. It did rain a little during the race, but it worked out pretty well. And it was certainly one of the most scenic races I’ve ever run.”

It was also one of the states where Conradi enjoyed the company of his wife, who picked certain marathons to visit based on the duration of the trip and the location.

“My favorite one that I went to was in Hilo,” she said. “It was really pretty, and we drove back up through there a couple of times in the rainforest, and you could see the ocean [from] certain parts. It wasn’t that big a race, and I didn’t have to get up that early. They took them up to the rainforest, and they came downhill and the loop came right past our hotel, so I went out there to a little Japanese garden, and I was waiting [for him to arrive]. He gives me a ballpark figure of

A At the South Mountain Reservation in New Jersey, Don Conradi (17) is joined by his sister, Ellen, and brother-in-law, Fred Jacques, at a race in 1995.

about what time to expect him, so I look down the road—and he has this certain way that he runs—and I said, ‘That’s got to be him!’ And it was,” she said with a laugh about his familiar limping cadence from knee and hip injuries.

“I wanted to go to the ones where we could stay for at least a week and were nice places, like Myrtle Beach, New Mexico (Duke City Marathon in Albuquerque), Las Vegas, and Hawaii,” she said. “For Alaska, he did ask me if I wanted to go for the weekend, but I said no. [I] wanted to go to Alaska when I could take a nice cruise up the Inside Passage—which we did years later—but not for a long weekend.”

The Colorado Marathon, advertised as the most scenic marathon in the Centennial State, is a point-to-point course along the Poudre River from Steven’s Gulch Campground to Old Town Plaza in Fort Collins.

“I went out there a couple of days early,” said Conradi, “up to Estes Park, where the Rocky Mountain National Park is, and there was a major snowstorm [when I was] driving through the mountains there, but when I got back to Fort Collins in the valley it was OK. It was a gorgeous course. The course itself followed a mountain stream, and there was a lot of downhill, which is always good. There can be too much, but this was pretty gradual.”

Added Ellen about Colorado, “Fred has problems with altitudes, and this seemed to have one of the lowest altitudes of all the Colorado marathons, so that is why we picked it. Don finished a little before us, [and] Fred did have a little trouble breathing,” she said. “The funny thing when we were done and walking

Photo courtesy of Don Conradi

back to the parking garage was seeing two ladies who had been volunteers at the 19-mile mark and remembered seeing all three of us when we passed that mile mark. One of the ladies told Don that she could tell that he had a hip replacement by the way he walked, since she had had one herself. She wanted to know what ‘pet’ name he had given his artificial hip! He was too stunned to answer.” Conradi finished in 5:05:41, and Ellen and Fred followed in 5:28:32.

Injuries

“Torn Achilles tendon, plantar fasciitis, torn knee cartilage, torn MCL (medial collateral ligament), torn ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), arthritic hips and hands, athlete’s foot, rotator cuff injury, dog bites, frostbites, side stitch, dehydration, sunburn, back pain—these are some of the injuries I’ve had,” Conradi said. “And I’ve been told three different times by doctors that I’d never run again.”

Injuries are inevitable in 105 marathons. The goal, of course, is to run injury free as much as possible. But Conradi never enjoyed any marathon with a fresh body. While he certainly properly trained for them, it wasn’t with an unblemished physical background.

His patient file began as an active teen in northern Illinois, where the young Conradi grew up and first suffered a knee injury.

“T didn’t even know how I got it, so my parents took me to the doctor, and they diagnosed me as having Osgood-Schlatter disease, which is basically a growth of extra cartilage on your knee [from] if you hit your knee at a certain stage of growth, mostly in boys,” he explained. “I was told I couldn’t participate in any sports at all for over a year. And that was kind of devastating to me, so I did what most 14-year-olds would do, and I went out and played basketball the next night and wrecked the other knee,” he laughed.

After a full year of recuperative inactivity, he then suffered a football injury in high school that cut short his freshman athletic year. By the time he was a sophomore, he had decided to devote more time to work and studies. He enrolled at Northern Illinois University and resumed playing basketball and other sports, then graduated, found a job, got married, and began a family.

In 1978, however, he was injured while playing on his company softball team.

“T was going into second base on a slide, and I think I really couldn’t decide if I was going to go in head first or feet first and did something halfway in between,” he recalls. “I did a lot of damage to my right knee. They told me, basically, I had a choice of having a complete knee replacement or going through a rehab program.”

Conradi chose the latter and was progressing well, but about a year later, he found himself buckled on the hardwood of a basketball court. “I went through the rehab program and I did pretty well, but I got reinjured in that basketball game, and in fact, I actually heard something snap at that point,” he said.

Twice during this rehab stint his knee collapsed under him, and once he tumbled down a flight of stairs.

Once again, he was presented with a choice.

“I went back to the doctor, and I went in for what they called at that time a complete knee reconstruction—it wasn’t a replacement—and basically they stitched up my ACL and my MCL and took out all the cartilage in my right knee,” he said. “Between those two times [with rehab], I spent almost two years on crutches. And I gained about 50 pounds during this period of time,” thanks in part to the inactivity and to quitting smoking.

Enter running

Around this time of rehabbing, convalescing, and bloating—and before any of his marathons—his other brother-in-law, Fred Bazzoli, was training for a halfmarathon. This was when Conradi took up racing. He had never previously entered a road race, and his running was only in relation to other activities.

“T really hadn’t done any running, competitive or otherwise, on my own,” he said. “I had done running as part of training for some of the other sports, but I probably figured I couldn’t run because I had gained the additional weight and still had some bad knees.”

~

Photo courtesy of Don Conradi

A Don Conradi, far right, and his sister, Ellen, and brother-in-law, Fred, stand outside the expo at the Hynes Convention Center on Boylston Street, located a few blocks from the finish line of the Boston Marathon.

But his eyes were opened to the sport when he watched his brother-in-law race.

“T noticed there were people older than me—I was about 35 at the time—and possibly even in worse shape than me,” Conradi said. “The next time he had a race, there was a one-mile race before that. So I ran the race and finished about 10th out of about 150 runners with what I thought was a good time. Realistically, Thad no idea if it was really a mile—it could have been considerably less than a mile—and secondly, most of the people I beat were little kids. But nevertheless, it inspired me to move on.”

And move on he did. Three weeks later, he ran a 5K, and then a 10K a month later, followed by another 10K.

“T wanted to improve on that [first 1OK],” said Conradi, “and as I was finishing the race I stepped on a pothole with my left foot and tore my left Achilles tendon. Back to the doctor and another month on crutches with just rest, but I was inspired to really get into the sport. Mentally, I was ready.”

He had set his sights on of seeing what distance he could cover, and after having already run races of 3.1 and 6.2 miles, the logical next step was 13.1 miles. In the spring of 1985, he successfully ran the Lake County Half-Marathon in the nearby town of Zion in Illinois. Chicago was next!

The first one

Conradi joined his company’s running team for the 1985 Chicago Marathon. Although both nervous and excited, he was reassured with support from Fred Bazzoli, who planned to train and run with him. However, that did not go as planned.

“He was going to run it also, but during the training program, he dropped out because his daughter was due actually on the day of the race,” Conradi said. “And she was actually born during [the time of] the race! So it was probably a good thing he didn’t run with me.”

With a goal of a sub-4:00 marathon, Conradi clocked 3:41 and was among the company’s team results, which was a pleasant surprise.

“They count the top five best times in the team competition, and I was number five, so I was really happy that I contributed,” he said. “And I decided it wouldn’t be just a one-marathon thing and that I would do a few more.”

However, with his first marathon completed, his wife thought that would be it—one and done! “I always remember when he finished his first marathon, I thought, Oh, that’s nice. Now he’s done with it. Little did I know,” Candy said with a laugh. “It’s addictive.”

He returned to Lake County the following year, ran its full marathon, and was also part of his company’s victorious running team.

“We actually won that one. Not that we were that fast—it was a very hot day—but we were the only team that actually had five people finish the race, so

that worked out reasonably well for us,” he said. “I think once that happened, my goal was always to run Boston.”

Boston

“T originally had no idea how difficult it was to meet the qualifying times for Boston,” he recalled. “At Chicago, I was still about 30 minutes off from what I would need. In those days, you had to be under three hours if you were under 40 or 3:10 if you were over 40.”

Conradi ran a few more marathons in his quest to qualify, including New York and the St. Louis Marathon in 1987 and the Lakefront Marathon in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1988. By the time he ran his fifth marathon, Conradi had turned 40 and was therefore afforded extra time to qualify. And it helped.

“T could drive to the Milwaukee marathon. It wasn’t that far from my house, and it was a nice cool day, and I managed to do it in 3:08, which qualified me for the 1989 Boston,” he said.

The quintessential marathon in Massachusetts was everything he thought it would be, and more. He lived more than a thousand miles away, and nothing had prepared him for the majesty, the spectacle, the history, and the experience of this defining athletic event.

“When I went to Boston, I had read a lot of books about Boston. I was even working for a Boston-based company, so I knew people there. Boston had always been special,” he said, “but it kind of exceeded my expectations. I tried to really immerse myself. I took the tour of the course in the bus—it was pouring rain the entire time. We went to the carbo dinner in the sleet and rain and cold. And of course on race day, it was hot and humid.

“When I ran Boston, it started at noon. You get to Hopkinton at eight o’clock, and you sit there for four hours until it gets really hot, and then you go out,” he laughs. “The crowd support in Boston is not comparable to any other race, and I’ve run 105 marathons! There’s nothing comparable. It’s done on a quasi-holiday. My company doesn’t give me the day off! People are knowledgeable, they’re supportive, they don’t do dumb things like walk in front of you when you’re running. The cheering at Wellesley College is legendary, and at Boston College—the entire course, really.”

Number 50

For Conradi, it all came down to Grandma’s. On June 20, 2009, nearly two dozen years after his first marathon, the 61-year-old ran the 33rd annual Grandma’s Marathon for his 50th state and, coincidentally, his 100th marathon. Accompanied by his son, Jeff, who had also run the 2004 Chicago Marathon, he decided to take the train to the start instead of the bus.

“Tt was the wrong choice,” he said. “There were two means of transportation to get to the start, and we thought the train would be interesting. [But] it made too many stops, and it went too slow. It got us there only a minute or two before the race started, so there really wasn’t adequate time to stretch and get ready and hydrate and check your clothes in. We got there and boom, it started. And it was already 75 degrees!”

This was a momentous occasion for the elder Conradi, who anticipated that Jeff would finish before him and had given his son the camera to record the longawaited and hard-earned finish.

“I knew he was going to finish ahead of me—he did beat me by an hour and a half, which is where he should have been—and he did very well and made sure to take a whole sequence of pictures of me coming into the line and finishing … he even had pictures of me throwing up after the race,” he said with a laugh. “Kids are good for that.”

Three months later, Ellen and Fred Jacques achieved their 50th in Manchester, New Hampshire. And cheering them on were none other than Conradi and his wife, Candy, to make it a warm and supportive family affair.

“Tt felt like a wonderful accomplishment, [and] it felt better to share it with our family,” said Fred, who finished in 5:24:23 at the age of 61. “Being able to finish it as a couple made it more meaningful. Physically, it had been a challenge. We had the usual aches and pains and some more difficult knee and hamstring problems to cope with. In the last 12 or so marathons, Ellen ran in a compression sleeve and gauntlet on the arm that had the nodes removed. She changed this [at] about [the] 14mile mark in each of these marathons to put on dry replacements,” Fred said. He credits former US Olympian Jeff Galloway’s method of incorporating