What better reason to party than watching thousands of runners pad by your house.
Judi and Steve Boggess erected a dining fly at the foot of their driveway on Scottview Drive. From it, they dispensed pastry, quiche, coffee and Bloody Marys to about seven of their neighbors.
It’s the fourth race in as many years that the couple has used as an excuse to entertain.
“We can’t get out of the neighborhood, so we have a party,” said Judi Boggess, who works in the marketing department of a downtown law firm.
. . .
Dean Burns, 45 and a resident of the west end of Henrico County, stood patiently waiting for the start of the half marathon. Around his waist was his hydration belt, filled with two bottles of water and two bottles of a sports drink.
“I need to keep hydrated during the race,” he said.
Burns also was wearing a clear plastic bag.
“My father-in-law taught me this trick several years ago,” Burns said. “The bag is disposable. I’ll throw it away before I go to the starting line.”
Not far from Burns were David Croteau, 46, and Cecelia Kirkman, 48. They had come from Stafford County to run. Croteau was in the marathon, Kirkman the half-marathon.
They wore dark green garbage bags over their running clothes.
“Standing around in the rain is the worst part of it,” Croteau said.
. . .
Sheila Imobisa has come to the conclusion that the family that exercises together has more fun together. Yesterday, the Chesterfield County resident persuaded her husband Francis and daughter Janet to run the 8K with her.
It went well once Imobisa got everyone up and going.
“It was hard to get her up,” Sheila Imobisa said, looking at her 22-year-old daughter.
Janet, though, was glad her mother made the effort.
“It was very challenging and very rewarding,” Janet said of her first 8K.
Janet is a senior at Virginia State University, where she is a sociology major. She also works for the Health Management Corporation.
One family member, 16-year-old Irabor Imobisa, was excused from the day’s exercise.
“He’s a football player at Meadowbrook, an offensive lineman,” Francis Imobisa said.
“He’s sleeping in,” Sheila Imobisa said.
. . .
Ray Patterson, sitting on a motorcycle as course manager, said runners decide to quit the course for a variety of reasons. When a section of the course closed, he would ride back to ask stragglers if they wanted the sag wagon to pick them up and take them to the finish line.
“You can just have a bad day,” he said. “You may have felt you were ready, but for whatever reason you had to come out.” About that time, he got a report that someone had decided to stop just south of the Huguenot Bridge.
Weather was one of the factors in play yesterday.
“It feels cool, but it’s muggy,” he said. Later in the race, when the sun came out, temperatures seemed to soar. Some runners doused themselves with water to cool off.
“It affects people in different ways,” Patterson said. “People get to a certain point and say I can’t do it.”
. . .
Bernie Riesbeck, 53, of Virginia Beach, rode most of the course on his bicycle to support a friend hoping to qualify for the Boston Marathon.
“The neighborhoods are so beautiful here,” he said. “That stretch that goes by the river, that’s as pretty as it gets.”
Riesbeck went to VMI on a track scholarship and now his daughter, Lindsay, plays basketball at Randolph-Macon College. “She’s the superstar athlete in my family,” he said.
“I used to participate in these things,” he said. “Now I just look.”
- Republished from inRich.com
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