With the pandemic starting to finally ease, concerts, live shows and parks have opened their doors. The timing is just right as the Dallas Marathon will be celebrating its belated 50 year anniversary according to a Lakewood Advocate magazine article which reports,
“Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson and organizers of the Dallas Marathon have announced the December tradition wherein thousands of people from around the globe — for reasons ranging from personal improvement, competitiveness and #lifegoals to madness, masochism and myriad other possibilities — run 26.2 miles through our city’s streets is back on after a year off due to COVID-19. And what’s better? Back just in time for its 50th anniversary.
“This festival has come a long way in its 50 years, Johnson says. In year one, Dallas hosted just 82 marathon runners at White Rock Lake. Since then more than 300,000 runners and walkers have participated in the events. And it’s been growing. This year we are expecting more than 20,000 runners and walkers to get up and take off right here at City Hall Plaza.”
Mayor Johnson goes in to say that today people come from more than 40 countries to run the Dallas Marathon. So the effort to create a more distinctive, attractive event seems to have paid off over the past 10 years.”
The Dallas Marathon will even be more special as a renowned running icon and organizer James Thruston will be joining the marathon he so organizes for the first time according to a Dallas Morning News article from December 8 which reports,
“RunDallas executive director Marcus Grunewald calls Thruston “the godfather of running in Dallas,” and for good reason. Thruston has pretty much done it all over five decades. He has run races, organized and directed events, owned a running store in the 1980s and more. He was the second person elected to the Dallas Running Club Hall of Fame, preceded only by club founder Tal Morrison.
But Thruston has never run the Dallas Marathon. He plans on changing that this weekend when, at 84 years old, he will finally toe the starting line outside City Hall and run the race.
Thruston is excited about running the Dallas Marathon and hopes it is the official start of his quest to reach the Boston Marathon. He has already signed up for the Houston Marathon in January and plans on registering for February’s Cowtown Marathon.
“Why do I love running?” Thruston said. “I don’t know. I just love it so much. I think about it. I go to bed at night thinking about it. I get up thinking about it. It’s all I’m thinking about all day long. That’s the only way I can explain it.”
With the marathon finally nearing, Thruston will be the oldest participant in the race.
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