Welcome to the alley on the run show.
I'm your host, ali feller, and this is where i talk with people who are doing exciting things on the run and beyond, from professional athletes and celebrity runners to the everyday amateur and back of the pack runner.
We are here to celebrate everyone and anyone who enjoys a life on the run.
So, whether you are running towards something big or away from something that's been holding you back, I am here to hold your hand and help you pick up the pace.
It's time for my 2026 Boston Marathon recap.
Normally I record this episode right after I get back from Boston, when everything is fresh on my mind and I am totally and completely riding the Boston high.
This year it is saturday evening after boston, and i have put this off every single day this week, in part because trying to recap a jam-packed four-day business trip is a lot to cover, but also because i'm not ready for it to be over.
This year's boston marathon weekend was so, so special.
It was so fun.
This was my fourth year working the Boston Marathon as a finish line announcer and member of the World Feed broadcast team.
And I know every year I say this was the best Boston ever.
And you bet I'm saying it again for 2026.
Best Boston ever.
So, from the Thursday night arrival to the events and live shows, to the runs along the Charles to, of course, Marathon Monday, this is my 2026 Boston Marathon recap.
Now, if you're listening to this episode, I will make the assumption that you've been here before.
If this is your first ever episode of the Allie on the Run show, I mean, awesome.
Wow.
Hi.
Welcome.
Psyched you're here.
Also interesting choice for an intro to the show.
Just know that there are so many good interviews with so many incredible athletes and also like Katie Couric.
So go check those out.
Stick around.
That being said.
It is hard not to acknowledge right off the top what it took to get to Boston this year.
At last year's Boston Marathon in 2025, I was on top of the world.
I had been through hell in the form of a breast cancer diagnosis and chemotherapy and multiple surgeries.
All running parallel with a really rough divorce and adjusting to that and legal stuff.
My stress levels were off the charts.
But in Boston last year, I was finally seeing the light.
Seeing the light.
See the light.
Tangled is such a good movie.
Probably my favorite Disney movie now.
Oh, good.
We're going on tangents already.
This is going to be a nine hour episode.
So last year I declared over and over that it was the happiest and healthiest I'd ever been in Boston and happiest.
Yes, for sure.
I was flying high.
Healthiest.
My Crohn's wasn't flaring.
I was done with surgeries.
I was feeling comfortable in my body that had been through some stuff.
So yeah, I'd lost a lot of hair from chemo, but I'd just gotten hair extensions put in.
So I'll be honest, last year, Boston, I was feeling pretty great.
Except for, you know. some chest pain that just wasn't getting better.
It wasn't terribly debilitating at the time, but it was there.
I was aware of it and I didn't know it yet, but it was about to get worse.
Way worse.
Like unable to cough or sneeze without bracing myself worse.
Cancer worse.
I was so convinced I had costochondritis.
When that pain wasn't going away.
Yeah, the Internet is great when it comes to serious self-diagnoses.
So helpful.
But of course I later learned I was not in fact the healthiest I'd ever been in Boston, because that sternum pain was a recurrence of my breast cancer that had now spread to my bones.
So that made it stage four treatable.
But incurable cancer.
And obviously this totally and completely rocked my world.
I don't know that I would go as far as to say I didn't know whether I'd make it to Boston 2026.
A stage four diagnosis is scary in a lot of ways.
And it's especially scary when you get to the part where you ask your doctor, as if you haven't already Googled it to death.
When you ask how much time you have.
But I don't think I thought about Boston 2026 until it was time.
So as we got closer and closer to that third Monday in April, Boston started to loom.
We started our planning calls.
I was working out live show plans with New Balance and WBUR City Space and Shocks and, Of course, all the planning with the Boston Athletic Association which gosh.
What can I even say about the Boston Athletic Association and the people there?
Well, they invited me back.
Love that.
And wow, did they do it with a splash.
Again, I am assuming you're not new here, but.
The BAA put a photo of my dear friend Samantha Hansen, now Samantha Shriver, now pregnant Samantha Shriver.
They put a photo of the two of us from the finish line last year on the cover of this year's official Boston Marathon program and they revealed it to me as a surprise one day in March and they posted a video of it online and people were really excited and it was really cool and i don't think that the boston marathon program has ever like been a big, splashy thing before, but they made it big and splashy this year and it felt really cool and really exciting and um, you know, i will always have that bit of imposter syndrome, i think, when it comes to boston.
That's probably not the right phrase for it, but And yeah, there's always a part of me that's like here I am in Boston.
I've never run the race.
I've never been to Hopkinton.
I've never been to the start line.
But Samantha ran the race and we were on the cover together.
Me congratulating her at the finish line.
Lovely, wonderful, great.
So back in March when the BAA revealed this to me.
At this point, I've completed 11 pretty grueling rounds of chemo.
I again lost a lot of hair.
I was feeling pretty uncomfortable in my own body, which understandably was going through a lot.
And I was starting a new long-term treatment plan that included infusions.
That included includes I'm on it now.
It includes infusions every three weeks, shots every four weeks, An array of daily medications.
I'm getting surgery this summer.
So I didn't know how I would actually feel once I made it to Boston, but my outlook was pretty good at this point.
I spent a long weekend in New York City in March.
I saw friends.
I ran the New York City half and not only did I feel great on the run, I just had an absolute blast that weekend.
And I kept bracing myself for the comedown and for the aftermath, for the post-race blues.
But the sadness never came.
So I've really just been riding this high for a while now.
And I've put off recording this episode because I am not ready for Boston to be in the rear view.
I am not ready for the comedown.
And then I'm trying to tell myself, maybe there won't be one.
Maybe this level of joy and happiness gets to be my baseline for a bit.
Last year's crash was pretty swift.
I was the happiest I'd ever been until I wasn't and until I had cancer again.
I still have cancer now, but less.
My next scans are at the end of May.
And while there's always anxiety with that, it's also an opportunity to see where we're at.
So I'm trying to reframe it as an opportunity information gathering, but we don't need to go there yet.
Right now, all we have to do is relive my Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday, Monday and Tuesday morning in Boston for the 130th Boston Marathon.
I had freshly tinted eyebrows.
I got my old hair extensions put back in.
We'd had to remove them in June before I started chemo again.
And I have just enough new growth and scalp coverage after losing a ton of hair again, to be able to have some fun again.
No pesky chest pain this time.
Starting to feel comfortable in my own skin again and surrounded from Thursday night to Tuesday morning by the best people I know.
So that's the background.
Took a lot to get to Boston 2026.
I'm sure deep down, I always knew I'd be there.
I planned to be there until the end of time, or at least until the end of my time, which is going to be like 80 years down the road probably.
So I do say to everyone who made it to Boston this year with a hell of a story, awesome job.
I see you I am with you.
Oftentimes we see the celebrations and the three-stripe jacket and the medals and the cover of the official program, but we don't always see the mess in the background.
So to everyone who's got a mess in the background, it's okay.
We made it.
So buckle up.
This might be a long one.
Let's start with Thursday night.
Headed to Boston.
The Thursday before the Boston Marathon.
Let's start at the very beginning.
A very good place to start.
That's Doe a Deer, right?
Sound of Music.
That was my very first dance recital song.
I was in kindergarten.
I was five years old and we did Doe a Deer. in little purple costumes.
So cute.
So Thursday night, I decided to drive down Thursday night.
I usually drive down Friday morning and I'm stressed trying to get there in time for everything.
And so this year I drove down Thursday night.
Easy drive down.
I get to the hotel around nine o'clock and right away feels like coming home.
It just felt And I said this to a couple of people.
I was like, man, it feels like I was just here and I wasn't.
I haven't been to that hotel for a year, but I felt like coming home and it felt really, really great.
I always take note of the first person that I see, that I know, on these major marathon weekends and drum roll.
The first person I saw was Mr. James McCurdy.
Saw him at the check-in desk while I was waiting to check in.
I, of course, saw Corey, the hotel dog.
And then as I'm checking in, I'm so excited because in walks Chris Lotzbaum.
Chris works for the BAA.
Favorite person to work for.
One of them.
There are so many.
But Chris is just the nicest, the kindest.
We work really closely together.
He was one of the people behind the big program cover surprises.
And so I was just so excited.
Like to get to see people from the BAA during race weekend is exciting because they're so busy.
And so Chris walked in and was like, I have something to show you.
And so, before I even went up to my room, we went down to the media center, which is downstairs at the host hotel.
And he had and it was on like a I don't know an easel in the media center where all the media goes to pick up their credentials and their jackets, and everything was a huge.
It's not a poster, it's on um, what's like the poster board cardboard?
It's not cardboard.
What's the name for it?
This is horrible.
Doesn't matter whatever.
Uh, a huge version of the program cover and he was like you get to keep this?
Uh, not yet, because it stayed there for the duration of the weekend.
But he was like, this is for you.
And I was like, what?
No one on staff wanted it.
There wasn't a bidding war over who wanted a giant picture of me.
But it is now right next to me in my office.
And it's really cool and really special.
So I also got to see Celia, who works with Chris.
And she and I met.
She was actually the one who chose the cover photo for the program.
And this is cool.
She had just started working at the BAA.
She and I had never met.
She didn't know who I was.
I didn't know who she was.
And one of her first tasks was to go through their massive media library and pick a photo that embodied the Boston Marathon phrase and tagline, that is, meet the moment.
And she saw this picture of Samantha and me and was like, this is the photo.
And she brought it to the team.
And I think there were a few, but every it was like unanimous.
They were all like, this is the shot.
This is the photo.
And so it's been so cool.
Then I got to meet Celia at the printing company the day that they showed me the cover.
And so beautiful.
She has a long history with Boston.
Her dad ran Boston.
She's followed professional running forever.
Like she's in it.
And she was so excited for her first Boston.
So I feel like every time I got to see Celia, I was just bouncing off the walls for her.
Uh, you never forget your first Boston and uh, she's doing an amazing job and I love getting to work with her.
But also I was just like proud of her and excited for her.
And, um, I just kept thinking like, oh, she's so happy right now and you never forget your first.
So, uh, Yeah.
Thursday night, checked into the hotel.
I did the smartest thing I've ever done ever, which was as soon as I brought myself up to my room, I called down and ordered room service so that
I unpacked and it arrived.
It was so smart, I didn't delay, I didn't put it off, I didn't say I'm hungry and then do nothing about it, which is going to be the theme for the rest of the weekend.
Uh, I then ate the best bacon cheeseburger of my life, and um, That was exciting.
Great start to the weekend.
I also.
They do a really cool light installation on the side of the hotel, which is right at Copley Square.
And it's beautiful.
It's really fun at night to stand in the street or on the sidewalk, be safe and watch the light show.
I had a room facing Copley Square.
And the light show was shined directly into my room, shown.
When I closed the curtains, it didn't, but it was kind of cool.
I could like see it on my window.
So yeah, Thursday night drove down, checked in, immediately see familiar faces, immediately feel like I'm home.
And I think I was just like, this is going to be a great Boston.
Great cheeseburger, great Boston.
Friday was my big busy day.
Every day in Boston is super busy, but Friday I had a lot of different commitments that were all over the place.
So the big things for Friday are always the press conference in the morning.
I always go to that.
Then I host a panel at the expo.
And then this year I was doing a live show that evening with Claire Holt at WBUR City Space, sponsored by Shox.
So I had a lot going on.
Also, I was so excited because Cousin Jackie was arriving on Friday.
We've got her full recap coming soon.
I think it'll be out after this.
But she had changed her flight to come in a day early and to stay with me, so we could have a little sleepover before she moved into her hotel room with her husband.
Hi, Neil.
I wanted her to stay with me, but it's nice that she was with you.
I love Neil, but obviously I wanted more girl time.
So yeah, a lot going on all over the place.
I was up at 530.
I was tired, but I knew I wanted to get a run in before the day started.
And so I got up.
I went down in the hotel lobby.
Bam, Katie Hawks from the BAA, one of my favorite people.
Great energy.
You heard her.
She's the one that kicks off the Boston Marathon episode every year.
And so I got to see Katie.
I saw lots of people I knew out on the run.
I saw Danny Orr, who was at New Balance for a long time and who I love.
I saw Joanna Fortier.
And Joanna's fun.
Joanna works for Morton now.
But here's why I know Joanna.
Because her brother...
Was my kindergarten boyfriend.
Shout out JJ Fortier.
Yeah, I had a kindergarten boyfriend and hell no, Annie did not.
You know, we would just like sit next to each other at circle time.
So, yeah, that's how I know Joanna.
And it's such a fun connection that she's from Hopkinton and I get to see her at these race weekends because she works for Morton now.
Uh, and of course I saw my best friend, Ray Flynn agent to the stars.
I saw him as he finished up his run and I was finishing up mine, and we just like ran the bit back to the hotel together, which which was nice.
Friday morning is like truly the calm before the storm.
It's like you go for one run.
There's no one out on the Charles yet.
I was also out really early, but, uh, it's like calm, chill.
Uh, so that was nice.
I think it was also the only time.
It definitely was the only time that I fully ran by myself.
Oh no, I guess Tuesday, but we'll get to that.
I did go up to the gym.
I've been pretty good about doing my little, uh, 20 minutes of Peloton strength.
I do 10 minutes of core or Pilates and 10 minutes of arms usually.
And I was like, you know what?
This is going to go to shit once the weekend really starts.
So I did go up to the gym.
And then it was nice as I was going back to my room, I heard a familiar voice in the hallway and I looked down and it was Sarah Hall.
And right away she was like, And this was great.
We had just recorded together.
Her book was coming out.
It's just been her birthday, like so much to celebrate when it comes to Sarah Hall always.
And the first thing she said is she was like, oh, my gosh, I loved your article.
So this was the other thing is.
The day prior.
It came out online on Thursday and in the print edition of the Boston Globe on Friday is they did a profile about me.
Biggest, biggest shout out and gratitude to Amin Tori, who is an incredible writer at the Boston Globe.
And I've never done an interview like where someone's interviewing me with someone who is so prepared.
He didn't have a list of questions, he just talked to me.
He knew so much about me and my life and facts and people in my like it was.
It was so nice and so, but of course, like of course, I worry about someone else telling my story.
I like to be in the driver's seat for that.
So I was nervous about the article coming out, but It came out on Thursday.
It was so kind and generous.
And there were quotes from Dina Castor in it.
And so I will say and this will come up a bit, I'm sure is that between the program cover and the Boston Globe story, I was feeling like very exposed heading into this Boston overexposed, you might even say.
It's all amazing.
It's all so nice.
It's certainly better than the alternative, which is like I won't go down a dark road, but yeah, all so nice.
But I was also just like, yeah, you know, I'm not I'm not one of the runners.
There's 30,000 runners here who all have amazing stories.
And I want to help highlight those.
So anyway, got to see Sarah, went down to the lobby.
I saw Meb and Howie Kofleski.
It was Howie's birthday.
And so, of course, I made sure to tell everyone in the lobby that it was Howie's birthday.
I saw Clayton and Ashley Young.
I saw Rich Brothers, I saw from the BAA and Celia, just everyone was arriving.
The lobby party had officially started.
And then I did my next smart thing, which was I fed myself, ordered myself a little DoorDash.
And so I did stand in the lobby for a very long time waiting for my acai bowl and got to see lots of people I know.
And while I was down there waiting for my breakfast, a woman in a suit starts to walk over to me and I see that she has a Boston Police Department pin on.
She was with.
So before the press conference at 10 at nine o'clock they do a public safety press conference.
And so there's a lot of official people there.
And so I'm just standing there like I'm out of the way.
I don't think I'm causing any trouble.
But all of a sudden a woman from Boston PD comes over and I'm like, of course I assume I'm in trouble.
And she introduces herself and she asks if I'm Ali.
And I'm like, yes.
And she's like, I listened to your show and she was so excited to chat with me.
I thought I was getting arrested because of course I did.
And that was like a very surreal moment.
You know, at these race weekends, I get to meet so many people and it's so fun.
I didn't expect someone in a very official capacity to approach me and know who I was um and not arrest me.
So like huge win.
Uh, but that was really, really cool.
And then I went up to the room, I showered, I got ready, and then it was time for the press conference.
This always feels like the official kickoff to the family reunion.
That is a major marathon race weekend and this is when i get to see a lot of people that i work with.
Uh, so it's less about like seeing people who listen to the show or seeing you know my running friends.
It's seeing the people that hire me.
It's seeing the athletes, the coaches, the agents.
Like it's fun for sure.
But i mean the press conference is it's business, right?
Um, so I got to see a lot of the people that I work with in New York, like Matt Singer and Tony Lanny and Sam Grotwald, and the brilliant, amazing photographer, Johnny Pace was there.
And then of course, all the people from the BAA.
And I know I'm saying names that a lot of you are like, we don't know these people.
So why are you saying this?
But I know them.
And, in the off chance, that Lauren Proshan, Alex Marsh, um Courtney Parker, all of my media friends, you know like, if they listen to this which they probably won't because they're sick of me, but I want them to know that I saw them and that it was meaningful to me.
But also I'm about to miss a lot of names and people.
So this is not exhaustive.
Obviously, you know, my drill.
I take notes.
I take notes in the notes app on my phone.
And for Friday, there's like nine pages of notes.
And then by Monday, it just says race day.
I pretty much give up as we get later in the weekend.
Uh, one thing that stood out at the press conference is I saw Laura Thweet.
So Laura Thweet was a professional runner for a long time.
She's been on the show a bunch.
She's so fun.
Everyone loves Laura.
And now she is a coach with on athletics club.
So she coaches like Helen O'Berry, Joe Klecker.
And she comes up to me and she goes Hey, remember when I saw you at the 10 K this summer.
Where did you get that chocolate cake that you ate in bed in your robe?
And I was just like, Is this my legacy?
Like, is this what you think of when you see me?
And she was like I've been wanting to ask you about that chocolate cake since I got here and since June.
And so I forget where it was from.
Laura, we figured it out.
It was from like, what's the...
What's the family style place right next to the Park Plaza Hotel?
Maggiano's.
I'm pretty sure it was from Maggiano's and I got a piece of chocolate cake to go and obviously put on my robe and ate it in my hotel room.
And Laura remembered that.
So if I have an impact on this world, let it be that life is better when you're wearing a robe and eating chocolate cake.
So then by the end of the press conference, Jackie arrived and I was so excited.
I knew she was landing around like 1030.
Press conference was at 10, so it was perfect.
So she came to the hotel and I got to give her a big hug.
And then she shares this story in her recap.
But that was when we saw Dakota Popain.
And I was like, this is my cousin Jackie.
And Dakota was like, the cousin Jackie?
I feel like I'm meeting a celebrity.
And it was so endearing and cute and lovely.
So yeah, it was just obviously I haven't seen Jackie in a while.
And the last times I have seen her have not been great times.
Like when I've seen her, it's been for chemo or for scans.
Like we haven't gotten to just hang out and have fun in a while.
We do have fun.
But I mean, you get what I'm saying.
It's been for different reasons.
And so was just so happy she was there. went up to the room and then we went on a mission.
We needed to get Jackie food.
And so we picked up a bowl for her at Life Alive Cafe and we wanted to try to find newspapers.
We wanted to buy copies of the Boston Globe.
I was like, I'm in it.
I'm going to buy every copy there is.
And I'll tell you, we went to like four different places trying to buy a newspaper.
Very challenging.
We ultimately got them at a seven 11 and I bought all nine copies that they had.
But during that time, the finish line at that point is not yet open.
One of, I think, Boston the thing.
There's things about each of these races that are unique to them and that are so special.
Like, new york the final finishers right no one does it better than new york i think the thing that no one does better than boston and there are lots of things that each do the best and the most special in their way is in boston they open the finish line all weekend they have a dj up there shout out chris capozzi i mean there's several djs but chris is like my favorite one and You can walk through the finish and you can take pictures.
And it's like, I mean, it's a thing.
And I love that Boston does that.
And but on Friday, they hadn't yet opened it.
So it was all barricaded off.
And Jackie and I are walking by and we see Lauren Pershan from the BAA, who you've heard in the everything you need to know about the Boston Marathon episodes.
And she was like, walk with me.
And so we got to walk through the finish line.
There was no one else in there.
It was just us.
And it was really cool.
Like that's a cool thing to get to do anyway.
Right.
Um, I am in a position where I'm fortunate and I get to do cool stuff from time to time and I love my job and it's the best.
And.
I don't often get to bring my cousin Jackie along.
And so to get to have her before and she was running the race, of course.
And so to get to walk through with her and take some pictures, like felt very, very cool and very VIP.
So on our way back, Jackie also got to experience hotel lobby culture during major marathon weekends.
And we saw so many people we knew, Chris Heisler, Carrie Tollefson, Meb.
Okay.
I know obviously, that Let's Run is not always the greatest place to spend your time, that the message boards are not great, right.
There's some awful stuff on there, stuff I do not condemn, right?
Or that I do condemn.
I do not condemn.
It's Saturday night.
My brain's not doing so hot.
But I was talking to Robert Johnson and Jonathan Galt from Let's Run.
And I will always tell you that Jonathan Galt has always been incredibly kind to me and He reached out to me when I got my diagnosis last year and sent me a really kind note.
He listens to the show from time to time and he'll send me notes telling me that.
Anyway, Jonathan Galt, in the lobby of the Host Hotel, said to me that I am the best interviewer in the sport.
And I wouldn't normally come on here and be like, I got compliments, but like, he's a tough critic.
That was so nice.
And I never want to forget it.
So I'm saying it here for posterity.
It was awesome.
What a nice thing to hear.
The next big and exciting thing was waiting for goo to arrive.
Who's goo?
Her name is Megan.
We grew up dancing together.
She was my best, best dance friend.
And now she is a professional photographer in the Boston area.
Her name is Megan.
Our dance teacher called her Magoo.
And then one day my brother was like, what do they call you?
Goo.
And it stuck.
Everyone called her Goo forever.
I don't think I've ever called her Megan.
My family calls her Goo.
So I got to see her last year.
She's taken family photos of Annie and me and Ellie.
And to get to be with her in Boston is also so special.
Getting to experience these weekends that are such a huge part of my life now, and getting to experience them with the people that I've known my whole life, like Jackie, like Goo, that's a that's a whole other level of awesome.
And that definitely played into why this year's Boston was so meaningful for me was getting to experience this joy with the people who have been with me through so much.
And so Goo arrived.
She was my photographer for the weekend.
So I asked her to shoot the the live shows I was doing, including the panel.
And so She got there running late as usual.
We do definitely need to meet earlier before the panel shows, because this is like the third year in a row that we've been late.
And I'm so sorry about that.
But in my defense, they told us to meet at 1240 to walk over.
1240 to walk over for a one o'clock show.
Not great.
So we were running late.
But while we were waiting, I got to see Emily Sisson and I love Emily so much.
And I was happy to get to see her and saw Sarah Hall.
And it is always fun being around when the athletes see each other and to hear what they chat about, whether it's like general life stuff like how's your dog, or congrats on the book, or how's Shane, how's Ryan, how are the kids, or like how are you feeling, like it's just it.
It is, admittedly really cool to get to witness those conversations and, like So, got to chat with Emily for a bit.
Josh and Carrie Cox were there.
They are Amanda Vestry's agents.
Chris Lundstrom was there.
Yeah, and Drew Annie Frisbee.
So the panel was with Annie Frisbee and Amanda Vestry.
Hopefully, if you weren't there, you listened to it.
That episode came out last week.
Amanda and Annie, obviously amazing.
And so we all walked over to the show together.
Here's what I'll tell you.
I mentioned this briefly.
You know, the chat was great.
The crowd was great.
Thank you all so much for coming in the middle of the day on Friday.
There is a monitor at the front of the stage.
That's a countdown clock.
And I knew that my panel was scheduled for 45 minutes.
And so I assumed I didn't see the clock.
I didn't notice it right at the beginning because we just we were late.
We jumped right into the conversation.
And so I assumed it started.
It either started at 45 minutes and was counting down or it started at zero and it would count up.
I didn't look at the monitor until it said 18 and a half minutes.
And I just glanced at it briefly, not long enough to see if it was counting up or down.
I was like, I'll just check it again in a bit and I'll be able to figure that out.
So when I checked again, it was at six and a half minutes.
And I'm like, okay, it's obviously counting down.
I had 18 minutes left when I checked.
Um, now I have six and a half and I was like, this is flying by.
And normally I keep my phone next to me during panels so that I can check the time uh, since I don't wear a watch or anything but.
I moved seats.
Again, if you listen to the show, you hear Amanda and Annie were on one couch.
I was on the other and it just felt far away.
So I came over and sat with them, but I left my phone on the other couch.
So I had no way of knowing what time it was.
So we have a great chat.
We wrap it up and I look at Annie and I go, hey, do you know what time it is?
Because she had her phone and she looks and she's like, it's 133.
The show was supposed to start at one.
We definitely started a little bit late.
So I was like, OK, so we talked for like 20 minutes.
I don't know if it the I don't know.
I don't know.
I mean, I think it's fine.
We covered a lot in that amount of time.
Also, like, I don't know that anyone wants to sit at an expo for 45 minutes to an hour.
Like, I think it worked out great, but I did feel bad.
I was like mostly to Amanda and Annie as I was like oh, there was so much more that I wanted to ask you that we didn't even get into.
Um, and they just didn't want it to feel like it was like a waste of their time.
But I think I think they were cool with it.
So then the goal after those is to get the athletes out and get them back to the hotel.
They don't stay and do meet and greets.
They are running the race.
We want them off their feet.
Uh, I decided to stick around.
I had some time before the next place I had to be.
And so it seemed like a nice opportunity to stay and get to chat with a lot of you, which was really cool.
People had their programs and were asking me to sign them, which was crazy.
And my feedback for the BAA is that the cover of the program is too shiny, because when I was trying to sign it it wasn't working.
Like the marker or pen was just wiping right away.
So I'm so sorry if all I did was smudge your program, but I did do my best.
And seriously, thank you to everyone who came to the show.
Thanks to everyone who stuck around to say hi.
That's kind of the only time in the weekend that I feel like we get to hang out.
So it is nice to get to do that.
And then it was so cute.
And I saw this while I was on stage.
Kevin Hansen, Samantha's dad.
I see him over to the side.
And Samantha wasn't at the Boston Marathon this year, which was sad for me.
Like she's one of my favorite people was sad not to have her there.
She works for sound running now.
So she's like working her cute butt off.
And so I see her dad and, and her dad is Kevin Hanson of Hanson's Brooks.
He was Des's coach for a long time, coaches a lot of amazing athletes.
And I see he has a stack of probably 40 programs in his hands.
And it was just so cute.
Like it was such a proud dad moment.
And He asked me to sign all of them.
And so I did.
He was like, we're going to bring these back and Samantha's going to sign them too.
And we're going to have them in the store.
And it was really sweet.
So the crowd was great.
I spent some time chatting with Ray Flynn and Matt Sonnenfeld.
They were there.
Connor Mance, who they represent.
Connor was doing a panel right after my show with Laura Green.
So I got to say like a super quick hi to Connor and to Laura and then chatted with Ray and Matt a bit before we left.
I got to see the Shocks team, the panel that Laura and Connor were doing was sponsored by Shocks.
And so it was nice to get to just quickly see them, knowing we'd see each other again in a couple hours for our live show.
And I got asked to do A video with the World Marathon Majors team, the Abbott World Marathon Majors team.
They were doing like Elizabeth Pahota was hustling this weekend, doing so much coverage for them.
And she was so sweet and asked.
We had met at the press conference and she asked if we could do a quick interview at the expo.
Of course, yes.
And, yeah, it just everyone was being really nice and excited for me.
And I felt like a celebrity, which was equal parts very, very cool and kind and an honor.
And also it's like weird because I'm a girl in a robe who like talks to a computer.
So I don't know.
Everyone was really nice.
We did find newspapers after the expo.
We went to 7-Eleven and Jackie goes right up there and goes, she's in the paper.
And the woman at the register was like, oh, why?
And I didn't know how to answer that.
I was just like.
I don't know.
They wrote about me.
And it reminded me.
It's not the same, but it reminded me of the scene on Sex and the City when Carrie Bradshaw is getting on the bus that she's on.
And the woman goes, if you're on the bus, why do you have to take the bus?
And it's not the same.
But I bought nine copies.
Newspaper's $4.
Spent a lot of money, but it's a write-off, so it's fine.
I went back to the hotel with Goo and with Jackie.
Everyone was so excited to meet the cousin Jackie.
I should have eaten.
People all weekend were like, Allie, have you eaten?
No, I have not.
That bacon cheeseburger really...
Did a lot of work for me throughout the weekend.
I was just like, oh, I had a burger Thursday night.
It's fine.
It was so good.
I didn't have a ton of time to get ready because our next stop was going to WBUR City Space for the live show with Claire Holt.
The show was at 7.
They wanted me to be there at 4 to do a walkthrough, to do soundcheck.
Um, and yes, if you want me there for, I will be there for, I was really there at four Oh six.
And I was very stressed about that.
Um, on the way out of the hotel, saw my fave Parker West and got to chat with him for a little bit.
And then Jackie and I went over to the venue together and I was definitely feeling.
Like, I know that it's like, you're only six minutes late, but like, I don't like to be late.
And so I felt bad.
I was stressed.
Um, went in, dropped my stuff, immediately did the walkthrough with Steven at the venue.
Steven is awesome.
He ran the 5k and the marathon after working all weekend.
The green room was insane.
Shocks.
Shout out to Jamie, to Seven, to the team there.
You know, it pays to have a long relationship with people because they learn what you love.
They literally had all of my favorite foods in that green room.
They had charcuterie.
They had peanut M&Ms.
They had Levain Bakery cookies.
There was so much food.
And, of course, I was like prepping and busy.
My parents were there.
My parents came down for the show, along with my sister-in-law and my niece and nephew, which was awesome uh, but it was also like yeah, there was, there was a lot, um.
So the staff was amazing at WBUR City Space and I really just wanted to make everyone happy.
I wanted the venue.
They had reached out to me about doing this show a couple months ago many months ago actually as part of their Boston Marathon programming.
And so it was a huge honor to be asked to do that at a really amazing venue.
You know that I almost never ever ever, charge for my shows and we charged.
It was, I believe, 25 general admission, 10 student tickets, 5 live stream.
So thank you to everyone who spent money to come to the show.
That's a really cool thing.
I never want cost to be a barrier to entry for the events that I do and yeah.
So yeah, I mean, I feel like it was definitely fairly priced, but you know, I knew people were spending money to come to this.
And so I just I wanted to deliver.
I wanted everyone to be happy.
And then Claire arrived.
Claire Holt, who we had met so so so briefly in person once at a New Balance event back in.
When was that?
I don't know.
Some month.
October of last year.
Otherwise, we've just had like an Instagram relationship and she's been on the show before and I was so excited to meet her.
God, her energy is magnetic.
She is so funny.
We did soundcheck together and I was just cracking up during soundcheck and I immediately, like it, put me at ease.
And I knew because I've interviewed her before.
But I was just like oh, this is going to be a good show.
This is going to be a breeze.
She's going to make my job so easy.
And then more friends kept showing up.
The green room was overwhelmingly crowded, which is fun to have Goo and Jackie and Connor, who also came with all my favorite snacks.
And Um, my family and more friends came and Claire had a friend who was there.
Shout out to Luke.
Oh my God.
I would die if Luke listened to this.
He's he, Luke.
Looks like Connor story from heated rivalry, which was like the first thing I said to him.
And he did say a couple people have told him that I was like, in other words, you're smoking hot.
Nice to meet you.
Uh, And then it was showtime.
And the show was great.
I don't need to go into it too much because the episode is out and the feedback has been amazing.
I've gotten so many messages that are just like, I'm obsessed with Claire.
And I'm like, yeah, same.
What you didn't see.
I posted pictures, but when we were talking about Reed Weissman the second time, the team at WBUR put a huge photo of him.
Hi, Ellie.
Put a huge photo of him on the screen, which we didn't know they were going to do.
And so that's like we were cracking up.
There were just so many amazing moments.
Claire is hilarious.
I loved having my family in the audience.
Emily Saul was there.
I got to see her after Megan Featherston was there.
Feathers, like, where'd you sneak out to?
She sent me a message later that was like, the show is amazing.
And I was like, you were there?
So, yeah, thank you so much to everyone who came.
Thank you to Shocks for supporting it, for giving out headphones, for the unicorn headbands.
It was a great show.
Like I I my friends know I come off stage and I immediately say, what could I have done better?
Or I harp on a certain moment in the show.
And I'm like, I wish I could do that differently.
But like this one, we came off stage and I think Claire and I were both just like.
That was really fun.
I didn't want it to end.
So yeah, we were in a very good mood.
We Packed up all our snacks and then the next stop was going to Sweeney's, which is the bar at the Lenox, which is the New Balance Hotel.
They were having a party there and I always like to stop in and I knew the party's always super loud and I was like I cannot go to that party and yell talk for hours.
So I was like I just want to go.
I want to see my people like take a lap and then I need to shut it down.
I need to actually like take reasonable care of myself this weekend which I didn't do but I tried.
I had good intentions and so we go to the party, saw literally everyone at New Balance, which was awesome.
I kept trying to leave, and then I would see someone else I knew, and that's Just how these weekends go.
And I love that.
So then we went down to the lobby.
We had checked.
We had like four bags after the show with changes of clothes, bags of food.
Just we had a ton of stuff.
And so we're down in the lobby getting our bags and I see Deirdre Keene, who you all know because she's been on the show so many times, and she's the most incredible human.
I'm telling you Deirdre, and I will text before these events being like hey, we're both going to be in Boston, hope to see each other.
And we never plan it.
And we bump into each other at the most random places ever.
Every single time.
And it's amazing.
And so I saw Deirdre in the lobby.
I was so excited.
And then Jackie and I walked back to the hotel.
I was tired.
I was hungry.
Jackie and I are like totally ready for bed.
We're getting tucked in.
And then Jess Movald.
She had had a different event Friday night and she was like I'm coming to your room.
And I was like, hell yes.
Girl time in the hotel room.
That to me is the absolute best way to end these days.
And so Jess came to the room and we all just laid in bed and laughed and snuggled until we fell asleep.
I mean, Jess eventually left to go back to her room.
But yeah, we went to bed well after 11, which I just accept on these weekends.
Truthfully, I don't need a ton of sleep.
I'm sure I would feel even better if I did.
But I have so much adrenaline that carries me through these days that...
I will absolutely sacrifice sleep every single time to spend time with people that I don't get to see on a regular basis.
So Friday was so busy.
It was so validating to hear Jackie be like, I'm so tired.
Like, this is a lot because I was like, yeah, these weekends are nonstop and they're so fun.
And I'm working like I'm, you know, I'm doing stuff and I'm very on the whole time.
But yeah, it is it is nice to hear.
I think this speaks to a larger.
Maybe it's an insecurity of mine is that I do.
I do want people to know that I work hard and it doesn't matter.
I know I work hard.
But like in school growing up, people, I got good grades and people would tell me I was smart.
And I've never been book smart.
I've never been that like stereotypical version of smart.
I work really hard and I would study and I would do my homework and I would cram and like I think academically things didn't generally come easy to me, but I would work really hard to get good grades.
And now, you know, in this, this was the case.
Now I'm really going down this path, but come with me.
When I worked at Dance Spirit.
This was something that came up a lot with people in my life of that I was working my dream job.
And I loved it so much.
And that job involved going to Broadway shows and going to the ballet.
And so I would be at the office at like seven thirty in the morning, because I loved being the first one there.
Stupid.
And then I would work all day and then we would go to these events and I was working my butt off.
But I think what people saw was how much fun I was having.
And so oftentimes in that career, from certain people in my life that job was treated as a joke or as a hobby or as like well, I have a real job, you're like you're having fun, kind of thing.
And so I think that is an insecurity that I've carried with me to the present day, at the ripe age of 40, almost 41, that I know people see that I'm having fun and I don't really care if whether strangers know how hard I work.
But like I do want the people whose opinions matter to me.
I do want them to know that like this isn't just out.
I'm not just out there having a good time.
I've been working really hard at this.
Since 2017 or really before then, like I anyway, I know I don't need to justify it.
I don't know how this comes across and will be received.
But I I do like when people notice that I work really hard.
I've never.
I'm not doing all that I'm doing because I had a viral moment or because like and that's fine.
But that's not that's not my story.
Like I've been consistently doing this for years.
When I had a blog, I blogged twice a day for years and then once a day and.
Since I launched this podcast, there have been very few weeks that I haven't put out at least one episode.
And when I didn't, it's because I was so sick, actually more with the Crohn's than with the cancer Crohn's.
It's just like I can't sit here and record for an hour because I have to go to the bathroom.
It's great anyway.
I work really hard at my job.
My job, I think, is the most fun job in the entire world.
I am grateful for it.
I love it.
The work is so fun.
I mean, not the admin side of it, but like it's really fun and it's work.
And so.
All that to say that it was validating to hear Jackie who and she knows like she knows that I work so hard.
We talk multiple times a day, all day, every day.
So she knows.
But yeah, to get someone, to have someone along for all of it, like Jackie was with me all day on Friday.
And so I did go to bed that night being like.
Oh, that's cool.
It's cool that someone I love so much sees that I'm really working at this and I do take it very seriously.
I take my relationships really seriously.
I take the work that I do seriously.
The fact that I was six minutes late to be three hours early will haunt me for the rest of my life.
I'm incredibly hard on myself.
This is fun.
Let's get to Saturday.
Okay.
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Now let's go to Saturday.
Saturday was a long day, but going into it, I kept being like, Saturday's my easy day.
It's not.
It's still a lot, but Saturday I'm in one place.
Friday I was all over the place.
Press conference, expo live show New Balance party but Saturday I was pretty much at the track at New Balance all day I got up at six much to cousin Jackie's dismay she was not thrilled about that um I wanted to get up and get out for my run and the plan was to run with Jess which was so nice Jess is well you know one of my favorite people, one of my best friends.
And to get uninterrupted time together was really, really nice.
And so we ran together and we talked nonstop.
We were out early.
And so we didn't see a ton of people on the run.
We saw Des running with her husband, Ryan.
We saw Dakota, Annie and their partners drew in Montana.
And then we ended up cheering for the 5k, which wasn't our plan.
But we were, like you know, based on where we are.
We think that if we like get over, we can get the course.
And we had friends running, uh, Mary Wittenberg, Christine Burke, Ted Metellus, Rob Similcare.
They were all, all New York roadrunners people.
They were all running it together.
And we have Mary and Christine's locations on our phones.
And so and no one is better at Find My Friends than Jess Movald.
It is her most used app.
Jess, how many people do you have on Find My Friends?
Everyone.
So Jess immediately looks up to see where they are.
And they were. literally there, like right where we were.
It was fate.
It was amazing.
We saw them immediately.
We were going crazy cheering for them.
The timing was just absolutely serendipitous.
We did not see Claire.
We were looking for her and she had texted me that morning and was like, well, not going to send it.
I'm in wave three um, but she ended up getting bumped up somehow and so she sent it.
She ran a 19 minute 5k and so we did not see claire.
But uh, we saw lots of friends.
We also saw friends on the sidelines, on that same corner where we stopped to cheer for mary and christine and co carrie harris, who's on my ski team.
Like what are the odds that I see a friend from Hopkinton on the same corner that I'm on in Boston cheering at the same time?
And so, We cheered with Carrie and her friend for a bit.
We saw Lindsay, who worked with Little Sleepies for a long time.
And that's a brand I've had a relationship with.
And so we just kept seeing people we knew.
We had so much fun cheering.
People were cheering for us on the sidelines.
It was just like, yeah, this was my first year not working the 5K.
Every year I usually announce the start and finish of the 5K.
And I announced the miles, but this year, because my new balance show was earlier, it was just too much to try and cram in and I couldn't do it.
And so I unfortunately had to turn that down.
Uh.
But also it's really hard on my voice to do the five, K the miles and then announce all day on Monday.
We learned this the hard way in the past is um Being on the mic for that long.
I just do not have strong enough vocal cords for it.
I'm sure there are things I could do to strengthen them.
Again, I can quote something, which I'm going to go pitch perfect.
I have nodes.
I don't think I have nodes, vocal nodules, but anyway.
We'll be right back.
Of course, nice when it's nice out because then everyone's out and it's fun.
But the events are still going to happen no matter what.
And so during the weekend, obviously race day, we all check the weather.
But during the weekend, it's like I'm not changing my plans based on the weather.
So we just roll with it.
So then I went back to my room to do some show prep.
We timed it perfectly.
Jackie slept in a bit more and then she went for her shakeout run so that I could have some time in the room by myself to finish prepping for the show at New Balance with Eric Jenkins and Aisha Pratt-Lear, which I knew I was like.
And everyone was like, you don't even need to prep for it.
And I'm like, I would never do that again.
I work hard.
I like to be overprepared.
Even if I like, if I ask one question and then we go off the rails like that sorry excuse me while I pull a muscle, patting myself on the back so hard with that little pun or reference.
Even if I and I do this for the episodes too I like to be super super, super prepared, research ready.
And then if we go in a different direction, I'm cool with it.
I just want to be prepared.
People say it all the time, right?
If you're anxious or stressed or in your head or worried, the best antidote to that is being prepared.
And so I wanted some time to get everything on note cards and do all my final prep.
And I curled my hair, which I'm not good at.
My hair is also like Last year in Boston.
My hair, even with the extensions, my hair was much thicker and fuller and nicer.
And this year, we didn't get to put all the extensions in.
I don't have enough coverage for that.
Not a big deal.
I'm fine.
But yeah, I definitely spent some time fussing with my hair and trying to make it look okay.
And then as soon as I was walking out, I went to the show by myself.
Jackie's like, oh, it's fine.
I'll text Connor, Feeney, and Jess, and I'll go to the show with them.
And I'm like, yeah, no, you text all my friends, and you guys hang out without me.
I'm fine with it.
I was fine with it.
It honestly makes me so freaking happy that so many people in my life that I've gotten to introduce to each other are now such good friends.
You know, all I want is to bring people together and have community and connection.
And so, yeah, I love knowing like also it was nice to have Jackie with me because she's just easy.
Like I don't need to.
We're just so comfortable with each other.
There's never any like she can tell if I need a minute.
I can tell if she needs a minute.
It's just that like nice unspoken friendship.
And so I was heading to the show.
New Balance is amazing.
They always send a car to pick me up for these shows, which like.
Again, I'm walking out of the hotel to be greeted by my driver.
And it's like so fun.
And as soon as I walked out of the hotel, Claire and Luke are walking by.
They happen to be walking past the hotel.
And so we were all excited to see each other.
And Claire was like, you look gorgeous.
And I was like, stop, say it again.
Like.
Claire Holt is complimenting me.
Thank you.
But it was fun.
And I was like, where are you two off to?
And they were like, oh, we're going to a brunch with the Boston Children's people.
And like, dude, Claire is in Boston for a weekend.
Like she did the live show.
She did the work part, checked the box.
She could easily just like go to a spa, hang out. have nice meals, whatever feels good.
But she's like doing charitable things and spending time with meaningful organizations.
And I mentioned it in her live show.
She's raised more than two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for Boston Children's because they saved her neighbor's life, her neighbor's child, who had a heart condition.
And like she She's funny and she's gorgeous and she's such a good person.
It's literally not fair.
Uh, so it was just fun to see them.
And then I enjoyed the nice quiet ride over to the track.
It's like I think it's like an 18 minute ride and it was nice for me to just like decompress for a bit, have some time, because once I got to the track, it was.
It was go time.
I mean it wasn't yet because I was there early but got to see all the New Balance.
People did a walkthrough of the track.
Goo was there.
Eric was there.
Then Aisha was there.
We took over our green room at the track.
At New Balance is Mark Coogan's office Coach Mark Coogan, and.
Poor Mark.
His office was covered in, again, New Balance had all my favorite snacks.
There was a table full of just like mini Oreos, because Kristen McKenzie knows that my favorite plane snack, my travel snack, is mini Oreos.
Uh, so I have lots and lots of those that I stole on the way out.
Uh, and like friendship bracelets and sparkle pants.
And you know I say all the time that the thing I miss the most about college is getting ready to go out with my girlfriends.
I never liked going out.
I mean, I liked it, but my favorite thing about going out has always been the pregame.
It's been getting ready, picking what we're going to wear, which going out top we're going to wear with jeans and Uggs probably.
But yeah, I love the getting ready.
It's so fun and so getting to take over Mark Coogan's office and being in the team New Balance Boston locker room with Aisha and just trying on different outfits and telling each other what looked good like I I live for that and so
It was fun to get ready.
And again, everyone was in good spirits.
And I had a lot of really special people at that show that I got to see beforehand.
Most notably, perhaps, Dee, my college roommate, who you heard on a Support Squad episode.
Dee and I have been friends now for 22 years.
Absolutely insane to have a friendship that long.
And it's really great, obviously.
And she was there with her husband Kurt, and their daughter Pia, and Pia's the best and the cutest and I'm sure it was a little overwhelming walking into the chaos and just getting thrown into it, but again getting to stand back while Dee hugged, Connor and Jackie, and like all my friends who now know each other, and sure, Maybe it's a little bit of cancer that brought everyone together, but I'll take it like we're.
We're one big, happy family at this point.
And so yeah, getting ready was just peak girlhood, girlhood plus, like Eric and Connor and James from New Balance.
But we definitely had a great.
A great crew.
Another thing that I always do before these events, and I never know if people notice these details, but I always make a playlist for my live shows and the playlist is played from when the doors open until the show starts, and
There are some songs that make it on every single pre-show playlist and there are some that it rotates depending on the mood and what I'm into.
But if you ever notice the music, I did that.
That was always my thing in college where like my friends would roll up and their contributions would be like, the mini fridge for the room or the appliances or like the important stuff.
And I was like, I'll make the mix for when we're in the car driving.
I love a mixed CD.
That was always my role.
And so still doing it at 40, almost 41.
And so.
I always also pick walkout songs for me and for the guests.
And my walkout song for the New Balance show was Taylor Swift Out of the Woods, which felt nice because previous songs have included.
I Can Do It With a Broken Heart and Life of a Showgirl was a fun one.
It was opalite in New York because we were dancing through the lightning strikes and I was still in a pretty rough place, like very much in a rough place in Chicago and New York.
And so this was just like, we're out of the woods, baby.
And God, watch me get my next scans and it'd be really bleak.
And if that happens.
Part of the reason this episode is going to be nine hours long is because I want to remember how much fun I had in Boston.
If things go to shit after this, we'll deal with it.
And we had a lot of fun leading up to it.
I don't think that's going to happen.
Delusional optimism.
The show was really fun.
Eric and Aisha, obviously a good time.
I laughed the whole time.
We haven't done our official debrief yet with like me and the New Balance team.
It was really cool.
This year it was different.
Last year we were in the throwing room.
This year we were on the track.
They built a huge stage on the track for us and then everyone was in the stands.
We sold more than 700 sold.
They were free, but more than 775 tickets to this.
So definitely was a big crowd in there.
Um, I don't know if I loved it for a live show.
The audience felt really far away.
Um, and I like to be a little bit more interactive with the crowd.
And so I am eager to see what the New Balance team thought of this setup.
Um, I like it to not be intimate.
I love having a huge crowd, but I like being able to like see your facial expressions a bit more and um, So yeah.
And if you were there, I'm curious, did we seem too far away?
Did it seem cool?
One of the things I loved was, as soon as we came off stage, they it was like the Super Bowl, where they change it over really quick for the halftime show.
I was just sad no one was dressed as grass, as human grass.
But after the live show ended, we ran back up to the green room because... Really, Ellie?
It's 5.49 p.m., which is Ellie's exact dinner time.
She came to let me know.
I'll give you dinner in a bit.
Maybe I'll feed myself too.
So the New Balance Marathon relay was...
A massive highlight of the weekend.
This was the second year they've done this event where they bring in all kinds of different teams.
This year, the teams were much bigger.
You could have up to 26 people on your team and you run a mile at a time, which it's an indoor track.
Eight laps, too many.
The track is banked.
So yeah, it's hilly.
It's insane.
Chris, so I was on the Sidious Mag team, honored.
And before the race, Chris Chavez, he was like, we're going to get you a pair of spikes to race in.
And I was like, I've never even held a spike, let alone warm one.
And.
So we run up to Coogan's office.
There were so many people up there at that point because there were people getting ready for the relay.
There were people from the show.
There were people who came backstage like Judy and Kevin Donnelly and Anush R Kelly, who just had a baby.
Her baby Tali, wasn't with her, but to see Anush and I'm like There were so many moments this weekend that I wish I'd had more time like Anush and I hugged super briefly.
And I'm like, I want to sit down with you for hours and talk to you.
But that's just not.
Boston just doesn't work that way.
And so we changed quickly and I wasn't nervous.
But like I've never run on an indoor track except for doing a couple laps with Annie after New Balance Indoor Grand Prix,
I've never I've run one race on a track, the The Media 800 at World Championships in 2022 at Hayward Field.
So two laps of Hayward.
This was going to be eight laps.
I, of course, was like, everyone stick around.
And so I knew like we would know people there.
But I mean, it was so fun.
Like, again, vibes were perfect.
So they have it all set up.
There is a DJ.
There's an announcer.
They announce each team and you run out while there's pyrotechnics going like.
You feel like an absolute rock star at this event and
Um, we were a little bit rushed in the transition from live show to the race.
I was the sixth runner on our team, which six is my lucky number.
So that was perfect.
And so I get down there and I find the city as team and Chris just has the biggest smile on his face.
And he walks up to me with a shoe box and he goes, here you go.
And he got me a pair.
Oh, I think Caitlin New Balance probably got them per Chris's request.
If I had to guess, they are the hot pink Gabby Thomas spikes.
And I was like, I cannot put spikes on for the first time.
Like, what if they feel terrible?
I have no idea what they're what what if they get stuck in the track?
I don't know how spiky they are.
I don't know how to do this.
Um, and so I opened the box to look at them and the spikes which again, I didn't know.
You have to like screw them in, and they weren't yet screwed in and we didn't have time to do that.
So it's like, all right, I'm going to keep them for next year.
Uh, but I did not race in spikes.
I wore the SC elite V fives and yeah, it was awesome.
I had a ton of friends running in the relay.
We were all on various teams.
Uh, but it's just.
It's really fun.
Uh, Aisha was handing the baton off to me and then I would hand it off to Mac fleet.
So I was like, great.
I don't even know how to do this.
Like, I don't know how to do a handoff.
I don't know where to stand.
So I'm like cramming to try to learn all the rules of this.
Uh, and I just didn't want to mess anything up for the team.
Like It's a fun event.
But Chris, of course, was like, we want a podium.
And I was like, then why am I on the team?
Like there are Olympians on this team and current professional runners on this team.
Christian Noble's on this team.
What am I doing here?
Eric Jenkins talking a big game about running sub five.
But like also, I didn't really care.
I had to ask.
I was like.
Do I wear a GPS watch?
I was like, will it work in the track?
And everyone was like it'll work for your time, just not your distance, which is accurate, because when I stopped it it was at like 08 miles.
But obviously I could see the duration of how long I ran for.
So what was really fun is while I'm waiting on deck, I don't know what they call it in sports.
I'm waiting for my leg and so Aisha's running and I'm counting her laps as she's going.
I also had to ask I was like how do you keep track of your laps?
Like it's not like a pro race where everyone's in a pack and then they ring the bell, everyone's all over.
And they were like you count.
So I like held out a little finger for each lap to keep track and so, While I'm waiting to get tagged in Lauren Fithian Fithy it's actually Lauren Honeywell, but we call her Fithy, as you know.
She and I just ran the New York City half together.
She's the best.
She's the most fun.
She was the fifth runner on her team.
But again, everyone's at different paces.
So you could be the sixth runner running at the same time as someone's 10th runner.
Like it's all.
It's honestly great because no one's like watching and keeping track of your time.
I don't think everyone's just out there all different paces.
There's an Achilles team.
There's people with hand cycles.
Zdeno Chara and Teddy Bruschi were there.
Bruschi?
Bruschi?
I should know.
I'm like, I prepare for things.
I don't know.
But anyway, there was a Boston Legends team, which was really cool.
Chara is so tall.
And so 50 is in the on deck area with me.
And I'm like, oh, my God, the way that it was playing out.
Matt Singer was running on her team and then Aaron Feeney was after her.
And I was like.
I think 50 and I are going to end up on the track at the same time.
And we're just like watching and we're trying to figure out what lap singers on and what lap by Isha's on.
And like 50 was like, let's run it together.
And I was like, and 50 is quite quick.
Um, she, if she were racing this, it would be, she would run much faster than I would.
So she would have to be the one slowing down for me.
And so, Which, like, she's down to have a good time.
But I said, I was like, no, no, no, race your mile.
And she was like, no, I'd rather run with you.
And I was like, hell yeah.
And so I got tagged in first.
So Aisha gets to the zone.
I think that I nail this handoff.
I've seen pictures and videos.
Didn't nail it.
Connor Nickel has given me considerable feedback.
About how to improve if I get invited back and there's a next time.
Don't think I'm going to get invited back, but we'll see.
I did bring good energy, I hope.
So I'm running and there's a big screen so you can see part of the track on the, you know, Jumbotron.
And I'm just looking up there and I'm like, come on, Fiffy. come on 50.
I didn't know how far behind singer was from Aisha.
And I'm just like, I need 50 to tag in now, not three laps from now.
I had no goal time.
I had never even thought about what I could run.
I think that I felt like I could probably run a 730 in the mile, but I didn't know what that would feel like.
I've been running consistently, but I haven't been.
I'm not doing workouts.
I'm not.
I'm just going for it. conversationally paced runs will say.
And those are usually between like nine and 10 minute miles.
Great.
Um, so I didn't, I didn't know.
I didn't really care.
I was just like I'm just going to run and I'll I'm sure I'll start too fast and I'll have to slow down.
Who knows?
I never once looked at my watch.
And so I was just running and it felt really hard.
And all I could smell the whole time was the sausage guy, which I don't think I would have noticed.
But Aaron Azar, Mrs Space Cadet had texted me earlier in the day to see if the sausage guy, the food vendor, was going to be there.
And he was.
And the whole time I was running.
People say that sometimes when you run really hard you taste blood.
I tasted sausage.
I didn't eat any of the sausage, but I just smelled sausage the whole time I was running.
I was super hot.
And afterward, everyone was like, oh, yeah, it's an indoor track meet.
Of course it's hot in there.
Like, that's too hot.
And.
Anyway, 50 tagged in pretty quickly.
I think she said it was after a lap and a half, which might be accurate.
I thought it was much sooner than that.
But all of a sudden she runs up next to me and I thought she was going to keep going, which was fine.
But she ran right up next to me and then we ran the entire rest of it together.
And thank God, because the first lap was really fun and it felt like.
Everyone at the track knew my name because the entire 200 meters around people were cheering and they're cheering for everyone.
But I felt like a lot of people were yelling my name.
There were a lot of people in Team Ali sweatshirts.
And for one lap, that was awesome.
Then I died a slow death.
And I didn't want people to see me and I didn't want people to look at me and I didn't want to make eye contact.
I didn't want to like lap one.
I was waving back.
I was giving thumbs ups.
I wanted people to know I appreciated the cheers.
Nope.
After a lap, I was like, this is too hard.
Everything hurts and I'm dying.
Of course, after the fact, I was like, that was so fun.
But during it, oh, gosh, it was really hard.
I kept stepping inside the track.
There wasn't an actual raised.
Why am I blanking on the word?
I talk about this stuff for a living.
A rail.
Jeez.
Off the rails.
Hello.
There wasn't like a raised metal rail there.
And I kept just like drifting into the track.
Uh, so I should have gotten DQ at least six times.
Uh, but yeah, I mean, it was fun and I was counting my laps and.
Mack fleet.
I could see him.
He's very tall, which helps.
He was waiting for the handoff for me and I came around and I, Hand him the baton.
And then something came over me because I was so excited to be on a team and to be a part of a sport.
And I reach out, I hand him the baton and I slap him on the butt.
And at first I was like, hell yeah, sports.
That's what we do.
And then I was like, oh my gosh.
You can't just slap a married man's butt or anyone's butt.
I was so I like felt so weird about it.
And I was like, oh, God, smack, smack on the butt.
And then afterwards, after he finished his laps, I apologize.
And I was like, I'm so sorry.
Please extend my apologies to your wife Samantha, who I respect.
The event was awesome.
I was relieved to be a runner early in the race.
I will only accept a spot on a team next year if I'm runner six or sooner.
No, I was perfectly placed.
I liked being done early.
I only ran one leg.
Other people on the team ran multiple legs and so then I went and I changed and I got to just hang out and it was so fun.
I mean I
I think it's extra fun for me because I get to know so many people there.
I know the new balance people.
I have friends there, other people on other teams.
Like there's a believe in the run team and and why a New York road runners team and a new balance media team.
And, uh, it's so nice to just be in one place and get to see so many people.
I also love that it's such a community focused event.
Sure.
There's the teams that are looking to race all out and get on the podium, but for the most part like, and even those ones are having so much fun.
It is.
There are so many different teams from so many different locations, different abilities, different goals.
It really.
I was asking the New Balance team like how do you measure success at a race, at an event like this?
Because they're not selling anything.
It's free to come.
The teams that are a part of it definitely get seeded a ton of gear because I'm pretty sure everyone except the few like sponsored athletes right.
Like Will Lear, was definitely running in Under Armour shoes, as to be expected, but like everyone's in New Balance.
So I don't know what the, I don't know if everyone gets shoes.
You definitely get a singlet, which is cool.
And so yeah, I was curious how they measure the success of an event where all the food and drink is free.
I mean, soft drinks, alcoholic drinks, they have a ton of food.
I eat none of it, but like everything is free.
There's thousands of people there.
How do they measure success if it's not a, you know, a specific revenue driver?
And everyone at New Balance was like yeah, this was a great success.
Like, look around.
Everyone is here and is happy.
And you could really feel that.
And I think, whether you were following along from afar, or if you were there, or if you've talked to anyone about it, I think it's going to continue to grow.
I think people are going to continue reaching out to New Balance, wanting to be a part of it, wanting to field teams.
I think that this is absolutely already, but going to continue to be a staple of Boston marathon weekend.
Uh, so yeah, it was a blast.
Um, you know, the race was over.
Uh, it's fun to stay until the end.
You see the final team finishing people jump in and run with their teams.
And so I stayed till the very end.
There were definitely people that stayed even later, but, um, I eventually was like, I got to go.
And so Jess and I left together.
We took an Uber back and then I was just going to go back to my hotel room.
But because I'm a sucker for a good time, I decided to go out to dinner.
Connor.
Kira Matt Singer, Jackie Kim Conley.
They were all at a bar together having dinner because we all wanted to watch the Knicks game.
And by we all, I mean only Connor cared about that.
So went to a bar where he could watch the Knicks game and we could eat tacos, and So yeah, went and met them and hung out for a bit.
It was really loud in there.
So I again was like, I can't be yell talking.
But I did have three very yummy tacos.
Walked back to the hotel with Jackie.
We saw everyone calls him this Nate from TCS and his wife, Laura, which we'll get to more of that.
But I do need to mention now that we saw them.
So we see them, we chat with them a bit on the street.
Jackie's telling them.
What she, you know, has since shared, or I shared, is that she's a vegetarian who ate steak tacos for dinner.
Everything worked out fine.
It was just heck of a choice for marathon weekend.
Uh, so we walked back, we saw them chatted for a bit, which was really nice.
And then I have so much stuff.
I have like four massive bags.
My room at the hotel was so far from the stairs and the elevators.
There's two separate sets of stairs and elevators.
My room couldn't have been further from both of them, so I do like the long walk.
At this point.
It's late.
It's maybe like 11 no, maybe 10.
I'm tired and my keys don't work and I'm like Oh no.
I was like, I'm not, I don't want to leave my stuff here.
I don't want to go back down.
And so I called the hotel from my phone and was like, can someone help me?
I don't want to come back down.
I thought I was going to have to go back down and like show my ID and all that.
But I was just like, I promise it's me.
And someone came and helped me and let me in.
And so I go in and I get in my jammies and I'm like, wow.
Today was an amazing day.
Nothing could make this better.
And then I'm doing my little location check because you know, I like to make sure my friends are safely tucked into bed, or at their hotels, or if they're somewhere different.
I like to text them and be like, what are you doing?
Who are you with?
Wink emoji, side eye emoji, tell me everything emoji.
And so I am like, oh my gosh, Christine Burke is in the hotel, which they do.
There's a gala.
I think it's the, maybe it's the BAA gives back gala, but it's at the hotel on Saturday night.
And Christine was there and the event had just ended.
And I was like, great, I'm in room 227.
And she was like, great, I'm coming up.
And so then, To close out Saturday, I got one on one time with Christine Burke, who came to my room, and we just yapped and shared stories and we FaceTimed with Jess and Connor.
And it was just like it was so nice.
I also, that night, was feeling like there were so many events going on and I felt like I was just at mine, which is true.
I was at my panel, I was at my live show, I was at my other live show, I was at the marathon relay that I was doing and uh, that is one of the hard things is, now that they're, I feel like I'm talking really fast, but I don't want to slow down because this is already too long.
Uh I, I don't get to go to enough other stuff and like, like I've never been to one, a dozen Kara's live shows.
I want to go to other people's things, both because I want to support other people and I also want to be part of the community.
I want to see what other people are doing.
Yeah.
So I I don't get to like go to much other stuff.
In Chicago I do get to a bit more, but Boston is just it's busy, and then I feel guilty of like I'm being so self-involved.
I'm only at my thing, you know.
Anyway, I went to bed around 12.
I think that was the night that I got to play wordle before the morning.
And that was really exciting.
The whole Wordle group chat I'm in, we were all playing Wordle at night because we were all up.
So yeah, Saturday was a great day.
Really great day.
Sunday is actually truthfully, my easy day in Boston Sunday.
You definitely feel a shift when you're in the city Sunday morning.
There's still lots of big stuff going on.
That's when some of those massive shakeout runs are there on Saturday too, but I think you see more of them on Sunday and then
Everyone I think starts like.
The finish line is always pretty crowded on Sunday because everyone's in town.
People taking all their pictures with their bibs.
It's good, happy energy.
But then the city, I feel like, starts to get quiet.
Everyone is going to dinner.
Runners are shutting it down.
So Sunday is like my it's all work, but Sunday is like my. work day.
My body woke me up around five because of course it did.
I went for a run at 730.
I wanted to do a slightly longer run in Boston that day, just because it was the one day when I had time when I could run a little bit longer.
And I'm so bored of running up and down my same street at home.
And so When I get to run somewhere different especially I love running in Boston I wanted to take advantage of that.
And so I started the run at 730 with Jess and Christine, which is perfect.
And then, of course, we end up picking up people, dropping off people, seeing lots of different people.
Um, Mary ended up joining us, Mary Wittenberg.
Um, I saw Bionicola Droiga, which she is a reporter for CNN.
Absolutely brilliant.
She was, she was on the alley on the run show.
It had to have been within the first probably 30 or 40 guests.
Uh, We know each other because we used to do SoulCycle together in New York City in Tribeca.
I would go all the way down to Tribeca so I could take class with my favorite instructor, Bethany Lyons.
And Bianna was always there.
And I was just like, oh my God, like, you know me.
Celebrities, fine.
People who work on the news, my ultimate celebrities.
And so I always thought Bionna was just like so cool.
And we saw her out on the run because she was running Boston and, I believe, got her sixth star in Boston.
And she's just the coolest.
And so we did stop and chat with her for a while, which was nice.
We saw Sharon Locchetti.
She was running by herself, which surprised me.
And she stopped. which like normally, and again, if I'm running, I probably don't want to stop.
I love saying hi to people, but like I'm out for a run.
The pros, if they're running, don't stop them.
Like this is their job.
They're running.
Um, but I was with Mary and Sharon saw us and she stopped to say hi.
And I was like, Oh my God, cool.
I love Sharon Locetti.
Um, of course, rooting for so many women in the field, but like I freaking love a Sharon Locchetti win, and so uh, we got to chat with her for a little bit, which was nice like, kept it pretty brief, gave her hugs.
Um, very cool to see Sharon, who of course, did go on to take the win the next day in Boston, and it was nice to get some one-on-one time with Mary.
Uh, we spent.
I was like I was definitely on a high from the previous two days.
I was really happy with how all the live shows and events had gone.
And usually I am hypercritical of myself.
And, uh, even if I'm happy, I'll, you know, and I do want to learn and grow.
So I'll always find things, but I was just feeling like really good about all of it.
I was feeling really happy.
And, um, Mary always pushes me to share my big dreams and goals and make bigger dreams and goals.
And she supports me in all of those.
And so we did like a big kind of goal setting run.
I shared with her some things that have been on my mind and that I would love to make happen at some point in my life.
And yeah, it felt good to. be in a headspace where I'm ready to talk about dreams and goals.
You know, for the past year, it's been survival mode and it's been getting from one day to the next.
And now I'm looking like a couple of years out and I know, I know, trust me, I know I have stage four cancer.
Super aware.
I know things can change and they can change really quickly.
Um, So I'm not trying to like pretend like things couldn't at any point go south, but I do.
It does feel good to be in a place where having those dreams is something I'm letting myself do.
Maybe that's what it is.
Is that I think?
For the past year I haven't really let myself think too far into the future because I needed to get through the now.
And this weekend, I feel like, was the first time that I've dreamed in a little bit, which is fun.
So yay.
Look at me.
I'm getting so cocky and confident.
I feel like life's going to go great for me.
We'll see.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I got to meet a lot of you on the run.
I was chatting with Mary.
I was wanting to get some miles in.
And so I hope it never seems rude that if we're running in opposite directions and wave and say hi.
Um, if I'm on the run, I probably am not going to stop, because I'm trying to get my run in with what time I have.
And, uh, but I, oh my gosh, always say hi and wave.
I love it so much.
It's like the coolest, best thing.
And I love getting to meet all of you.
So thanks for saying hi on the run.
After that, I went back to my room.
I took a shower.
Jackie came over.
And then Dr. Ian Nurse, who is my longtime, I always say he's my PT.
He's actually a chiropractor, but he is the owner of Wellness in Motion in Boston.
They have a ton of locations now.
He's the best of the best and uh, i haven't been able to get down and see him in a while and my, like i don't know after it wasn't after the track, it was before that.
It was like after i ran on friday uh my, it's not my hip, it's kind of like my is it my groin?
I felt it was like awareness.
It didn't hurt.
It wasn't pain.
We're not there yet.
But I was like, oh, I'm aware of this and I'm in Boston.
If I could get like a quick treatment to make it better, that'd be awesome.
And so I had seen Ian at the track the night before because wellness and motion at a team.
And he had said that he was going to be treating athletes until one o'clock on Sunday and he was like yeah, come by.
He was treating people they have in office uh, where the track house is on Newberry Street, the Tracksmith track house and he was like yeah, if you come around 11 I can get you in.
And I was like hell, yeah.
And I was also like oh, my god, like he's treating people running the marathon and I'm like can you fix me up a bit so my Casual jogs feel good?
But he did.
I didn't take anyone else's spot.
He squeezed us in, not just me, but he also treated Jackie.
We walked out of there and Jackie was like, I feel like I'm floating right now.
She was like, this is the best my body has ever felt.
And she went on to run a PR.
So I don't know if it was the steak tacos or Dr Ian, but And I have had no awareness in that spot since then.
So thank you, Dr. Ian, for getting us in and giving us some treatment.
That was very nice and just good to catch up with him.
Hadn't seen him in a bit.
And then.
We got an actual meal, an actual meal.
Jackie and I went to the bar and restaurant at the hotel and got a burger, because my burger had been so good two days prior.
And I was like, I wonder if it's still good during normal eating hours and not just at 10 p.m.
Can confirm.
I got an egg on my burger that time.
It was so good.
And then it was time for me to go to work.
So I met up with Kara Goucher, finally saw Kara.
It was the first time I had seen her all weekend on, it would have been Sunday afternoon.
Kara, the talent team for the World Feed broadcast.
I am the reporter at the finish line.
I interview the four winners.
Kara Goucher and Paul Swangard are on the call.
I think they are the best.
They're amazing.
They do such a good job.
They talk uninterrupted.
Um, the world feed does not have commercial breaks.
The world feed does not have segments and packages.
We don't do all the human interest stories.
We are just, they just call the race the entire time.
What they do is absolutely incredible.
They get no breaks.
And so we all met up and walked and Jay Holder was with us as well.
And we all walked over to do for them.
It's rehearsal for me.
It's just sound check.
And so I just go over and they have me put in my IFB, my earpiece, and make sure that I can hear the truck and the truck can hear me.
Normally they send me out to the finish line to do that.
It started pouring.
And so they were like, you don't have to go out to the finish.
We'll just do it right outside the truck.
And so we did that.
It was super quick and I was done.
And then I always that's when I go up on the photo bridge.
That is when I like to go up.
I like to kind of just like take it all in before race day, and that's usually when I see DJ Chris Capozzi up on the bridge and he plays Love Story the day before the race and everyone's taking pictures at the finish.
But it was pouring and so normally the finish line would be so packed at that time, but there was a mass exodus when the skies opened up and so hopefully everyone got their picture that they wanted at the finish.
Um, and DJ Chris Capozzi was running a bit late hopefully not like a full six minutes like I was on Friday but uh, he wasn't up there yet and so I went up and I was like, oh no, like no love story the day before the race, and so I didn't get to see him.
So I was bummed.
I just, you know, I wasn't going to wait.
I didn't know how late he was running.
So I went back to my room, actually got some work done.
I recorded all the intros for the live shows so I could get those off to Tyler, my brilliant, amazing editor.
And then it was time for our broadcast meeting at four o'clock on the Sunday before the Boston Marathon.
We always have a big meeting with the World Feed broadcast team, which includes the talent, the director, the producers, the stats people and the BAA.
So Mary Kate Shea is there to give us any last minute updates on the field.
She shared.
Fiona O'Keefe had dropped, which we had all seen earlier in the day, but we talked about that.
The team Celia and Chris are there.
Katie Hawks is there.
Scott Stover is there.
And they all share any like last minute things.
Jack Fleming, the head man in charge at the BAA, he always comes in and speaks to us.
And it's I mean, it's basically just going around the room and like everyone talking.
The meeting is like 45 minutes long.
And then I was texting with people from Sidious and it was just, we're at this bar, come meet us.
And I was like, done.
It takes so little to convince me to do fun stuff.
And so I went and met up with them at a bar.
And then I was like, hey, what if we went to a second location?
Because it's always a good idea to go to a second location.
And my proposal was that we all go to the bar at the hotel I was staying at.
Because at this point I was like, I think I will have a drink this weekend.
And the bar there makes my favorite drink called the Corey's Cooler.
It's a like cucumber, mint, that's like anything with cucumber I love.
And so, Again, took very little convincing.
I was like, let's go to a second location.
And they were like, great, let's do it.
And we got a nice big table.
There was a big crew of us.
But yeah, it was just fun.
It was a great group.
I knew they were going to stay out late.
I didn't want to leave.
But I also was like, tomorrow is what I'm here for.
And that's one of the other things on these weekends is I have so much fun in the days leading up to it.
And it's like, Oh, no, you're here to do a job on Monday.
Like that's the main event.
Go to bed.
And so I eventually went up to my room and got in bed around 11.
Not terrible, though I did have an alarm set for 430 the next morning by choice, by choice.
All right.
So by this point the notes in my app are just Monday up at 4 30 oof race day, so I'm gonna do my best to recap the main event.
But, as you probably know, my job on Monday is I am at the finish line all day.
My call time is 7 30 am.
They put me in hair and makeup, which I love.
The hour that I'm in hair and makeup it's just like quiet and calm and nice.
I just sit there.
It's great.
And then I'm at the finish line all day.
I have three roles on race day.
One is that I am the finish line reporter for the World Feed broadcast.
And so for the entire morning until we wrap at 1230.
I have an earpiece in, I have a mic in my hand and I am ready to do the finish line interviews with the four winners.
I do the first interview with them.
It's exciting.
Those interviews also go to the house.
So to everyone in the grandstands, they put that interview up on the big screen.
It's on the speakers, so you hear it, but it's also on the...
It's also on the world feed, which is kind of tricky.
I think I'm getting better at it, but you want to like.
The way that I would do an interview for people who are there live is very different than how I would do it for people watching at home on Eurosport.
I would obviously have like a lot more energy, I think, for the crowd.
So I think I'm getting better at that.
And I'm forever.
This is something that's been important to me since my first Boston is leaning into why they hired me to do these jobs and staying authentic to who I am, while also respecting that this is a very historic race.
This is a race that a lot of, a lot of people for better or worse feel a lot of ownership over.
It's a race that is steeped in tradition and history.
And so I want to come in and be there as someone who has the utmost respect for all of the, the tradition,
And you know, it's a, In many ways, it's a very professionally done race.
I mean, Boston is so buttoned up and so good.
And and also saying, you know, they chose me for this role for a reason.
And what can I bring to it that feels authentic to me without being like over the top?
Like, I'm not going to be silly, but at the same time, I do try to lean into what I know.
I can do, which is get a good interview out of the athletes and showcase what they just did and and make them feel really celebrated in that moment.
So that's really important to me.
So I'm world feed.
I'm also one of the sort of MCs for the house.
And so I do interviews with the grand Marshall, for example.
This year that was Jack Foltz.
50 years ago, Jack Foltz won the Boston marathon during what they call the run for the hoses.
It was 90 degrees.
It was so hot.
Back then, they didn't have water stations every mile.
And so people were out on their front lawns with their hoses and they were hosing people down, or you could drink from the hoses like whatever you needed.
And so this year we were honoring Jack.
He is also now the coach of the Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge team.
And I didn't know what to expect from Jack.
I love Jack Foltz.
I want him to come celebrate holidays with my family and me.
Love Jack Foltz.
And then my third role is finish line announcer.
I do that in an official capacity starting at 1 p.m.
I go up on the photo bridge and I work alongside TK Skandarian, who is my favorite, favorite announcer to get to work with.
And we call out runners finishing until the finish line officially closes at 530 p.m.
They do still let people finish after that, but that's when they cut sound and I hate it.
That's the worst part of the day is when it's like you kind of just like slowly back away and it's like I want to stay there because there's still people finishing and I love that they They still let people finish.
You still cross the finish line.
You still get a medal.
Uh, but they do obviously have to call it at some point.
And I I feel like doing it's.
It's like a walk of shame away from the finish line of like we're the announcers, we're the hype people and people are still finishing, but we're not hyping them.
And I hate it.
And um, I know all of the races are continually evaluating how they do things and finding ways to continue celebrating every runner, however they can.
I mean, New York does it like no other.
New York's also different.
New York, the finish line is in Central Park, right?
Everywhere else, they're closing down the streets.
They're closing down major roadways.
They have to reopen them.
So... it's different everywhere.
And again I'm so glad I don't have to be involved in making any of those decisions, because that's a that's a tough place to be of, you know, needing to abide by the city and wanting to celebrate the runners.
And anyway, so those are my roles on race day, race day.
I was up at four 30 because I knew I wanted to get a run in.
I also be Even when my Crohn's isn't flaring, my stomach is so fussy, especially in the morning.
And so I like to give myself a lot of extra time to do whatever I need to do and to physically feel okay getting out the door, not feeling like I'm going to have to run for the bathroom while I'm on the mic.
I went for a very early run with Mary Wittenberg.
We had talked the day before about running and she was like, yeah, whatever time you want.
And I was like, no, I'm going like I want to be out the door by five.
And she said, great.
And she was waiting for me in the hotel lobby, which was amazing.
I would have been fine running by myself, but everything's better with Mary.
And as soon as we started running, we were both just like.
It's a perfect day.
I think everyone woke up in Boston on Monday knowing like it's going to be a really special day.
The weather was amazing.
It was like cool, crisp, but it was beautiful.
We all thought it was going to be an overcast day.
And there were definitely times when the sun went behind some clouds, but like or buildings, I guess more for where we were, but it was beautiful.
And it really did feel like it was going to be a special day right away.
So we squeezed in, I, we ran, I think I probably ran 3.1 miles.
If I had to guess, we ran for around a half an hour.
And then I took a quick shower.
And then, of course, you know that I cannot miss the clap out.
I do that every year.
I make sure I'm there.
I love it.
This is a tradition that the host hotel does when the professional athletes, and they do it for the professional wheelers as well.
I did get a couple of questions about that.
The wheelers, I don't make it to the wheelers clap out because that's when I'm running.
I think theirs is at 515, which is right in the middle of my very small window to get my run in.
So I usually see them all down there getting ready, which I love, but I'm not usually there for their actual clap out.
And then the pro athletes.
So it's all of the the pros, their partners or significant others, their coaches agents, whoever's with them.
The pro athletes walk out and they feel celebrated, and this is another thing that Boston does like nothing I've ever seen before.
And now it's so fun because I've gotten to know so many of the athletes and I get really excited seeing them emotional, like You just know they're all on their way to try to do something really special and you want the best for them.
And so it's fun.
It's also it's fun to see like, who comes out first, who comes out later, who's together, who's who's filming it.
I've noticed an uptick in that in recent years that the athletes are filming the clap out so that they have it from their POV, which is great.
So I love the clap out.
It's just always such a fun and special part of the morning.
And then it's nice because I don't have to get ready because I get hair and makeup.
And so I went upstairs and I packed up my bag and then I headed to the finish line.
Marathon morning for me is pretty quiet.
You know, you do start seeing people in hotel lobbies and walking out to the buses, and the athletes are all getting ready to head out to Hopkinton, and So I go to the finish.
I go right to hair and makeup in the trailer.
It's easy, relaxing, quiet.
I was before that.
I should have mentioned this.
On Sunday, I started to get sad.
I was feeling sad that it was going to end soon.
I didn't let it consume me, but I do remember on Sunday afternoon being like oh, we're in the work part now, which means the weekend's almost over and I don't want this to end.
But then Monday starts and you're like oh no no no, like we're gonna have ourselves a day.
We have so many hours ahead of us, like this is gonna be nonstop.
This is gonna be awesome.
This is what we're here for.
Like
I do the live shows and I do the stuff at the expo and at the track.
And then you get to race in.
You're like, oh, this is the main event.
Like, this is it.
And so I always come out of hair and makeup and then I always stop into the truck.
Usually the broadcast is about to start.
They were still rehearsing when I went in.
And I always just like to go in and say have a great show.
To Kara and Paul and Jay and to Brian Williams who is in charge of everything.
So I get to see them and then I head out to the finish.
And what a fun thing of like, that's me reporting to work, going to the finish line.
And I know I say on every recap that the finish line is There are so many people there doing their jobs.
There are volunteers.
There's the medical team, staff and volunteers.
There's the BAA team.
There are sponsors.
The governor is there.
The mayor of Boston, Michelle Wu, Maura Healey, not respectively the opposite of that.
Michelle Wu is the mayor.
Maura Healey is the governor.
They both like seem to love coming to the marathon.
Maura Healey was there for hours and hours and hours like she's in it.
She loves it.
So that's fun to watch.
So there's just like a lot of people and there are always little traditions of the morning.
You know, we. taking a picture I always like to take a picture with Parker I like to take the picture for uh the team that includes Katie Alex Parker Scott Rich um I always meet up with my my guys uh Hank and this year I was with Brian he was my sound guy so everyone's everyone's where they're supposed to be and um I see my photographer friends.
Kev Mo Photo is always there.
Jane Monty is always there.
Johnny Zhang, Jay-Z Snaps is there.
And it starts quiet and slow and then it starts.
So I try to... Obviously, I'm taking in everything that's happening.
I also...
In my ear.
I can hear Kara and Paul on the broadcast, and I also hear our producer Brian, cueing them.
And so there's a lot happening in my ears.
It's definitely sensory overload.
And then we have a little monitor underneath the the photo bridge where we can pop in.
So every now and then I pop in to see how the race is playing out because, as much as I'm someone who likes to prepare, there's not a ton I can do to prepare for my role on the world feed, because it's all reactive.
I'm asking the winners how the race was.
And so I'm trying to see how it's unfolding as much as I can, while also stopping to interview Jack Foltz and greeting my loved ones who are there, which is really fun.
Another perk of the job is that I get a handful of finish line passes, and these have become a hot commodity in the Feller circle.
And so this year, My parents came down.
My friend Katie always comes with her friend.
They love Boston Marathon Day.
And then this year Dee and her husband came and Jackie's husband Neil was there.
So we had a great crew.
They were all wearing their Team Alley shirts.
I'm like, guys, it's not my day.
Uh, and, but it was cool cause I could so easily spot them.
And then the believe in the run crew is always down there.
Uh, Justin y'all is always in his corner spot.
Uh, so yeah, it is fun too.
Like even in the stands, you start to see familiar faces.
Um, and I had mentioned Laura who her husband is Nate from TCS, Laura Bolt.
She.
She's just someone I've gotten to know through the industry and through the podcast over the years.
And I see at one point that she is standing next to my parents and D and I'm like oh, that's so cute.
Like she must have recognized them or seen their shirts or whatever and said hi.
And then an hour goes by and they're all still together.
And an hour goes by and they're all just laughing and having fun.
And I like I just loved it.
Like I love that people.
I don't know.
It's just people coming together.
Yeah, it's the best.
And so.
I am not the person to speak to the race.
You can get those recaps elsewhere.
Um, I can only speak to.
My vantage point was that occasionally I would look at the screen and you know, of course, Marcel who took off with the.
For the men's wheelchair, uh, Eden rainbow Cooper came back and she won the race two years ago.
Uh, she won it this year.
I love her.
Uh, she's great and she's just such an easy one to root for.
And so I was excited to get to interview the two of them.
Marcel, it's like a joke.
Now he gets to the finish and we're both just like, good to see you.
Cause I see him at finish lines.
Uh, that's like our thing.
Uh, he's always winning.
Uh, this, the Swiss silver bullet is pretty unbeatable.
And then I would pop in and try to just see how the races were playing out.
Uh, I did catch it on screen that moment when Dakota and Annie, Dakota Popane and Annie Frisbee were at the front of the pack and Dakota's smile was just like I live for that.
Uh, Jess McLean looked so good.
Uh, Everyone looked so good and they were obviously running such fast times.
And then Sharon had her breakaway.
John career had his breakaway and it was fun to like, honestly, this was such an easy year for me.
I've interviewed all of these people before.
So it's nice to have, whether it's a bit of a rapport with the person, like Marcel or like Sharon, or it's someone whose story I know, like John career.
It makes like the interviews were so easy.
Normally I prepare two to three questions for these interviews because we don't have a ton of time.
We're not doing a full race breakdown.
It's in the middle of the broadcast, and So usually I'll ask a question and then I hear Brian in my ear and he says Allie, one more question.
So I ask one more.
He'll say, thank her or him after this.
And that's how I know to wrap.
So this year I asked my first question and I would ask my second question, and then I would panic because I thought my IFB wasn't working.
No.
I asked each winner like four questions.
I got so much time with them this year.
And again, that's why it helps to just pay attention and be as prepared as you can be.
Cause I got to ask them each a lot of questions.
And so it was nice.
We got to do like the, tell me about the race questions.
And then we got to do like an emotional question of why is this extra meaningful or whatever.
And then got to have a fun question which, like with Sharon, I was like Hey, last year after you won you went shopping.
You got to go on a shopping spree.
What's the, how are you going to celebrate this year?
And she goes, I really want to go to Chanel.
It was so great.
And so um, Immediately after her interview, I happened to see on the sides.
I saw Will Lear who works with Sharon.
And I was like, hey, did you hear that?
And he goes, yeah, she wants to go to Chanel.
And I was like, yep.
So I hope they went.
I'll have to try to get an interview with her.
So yeah, it all went well.
You know, it sounds like the World Feed show went really well and they had a good show.
And so then I take my earpiece out.
They shout out to my guy Brian at the finish who takes my sound stuff back, takes the mic back.
And then it's on to the next the next role of the day.
Now, I love working with TK and I probably share this story every year, but the way that TK and I we met through announcing races together,
But his wife, Kate, was my roommate at Quinnipiac freshman orientation.
So not freshman year, but like.
When we went to the school a couple weeks before freshman year started and you're just paired with people you definitely don't know, Kate was my roommate.
Nicest girl, nicest woman.
And now she's married to TK, who I work the finish line with at the Boston Marathon.
Like, just wild connections.
TK is...
The most energetic person I've ever met.
He puts me to shame.
He is he's so good.
He's professional and he's on it and he knows the history.
He knows everyone.
I think we complement each other really well.
We work really well together.
We play off each other's strengths.
He's great at.
He can recognize so many flags that people have and I'm like I've got Canada and Japan, like I'm not great with all the flags.
He's so good he calls out a lot of names.
I do more of the like, Sort of more generic, like you're finishing the Boston Marathon.
Welcome to the Boston Marathon finish line.
Whatever comes out of my mouth.
It's not planned, but I think we work really well together and we have so much fun.
I had a ton of people in my tracker.
I think I had 43 people in there whose finishes I personally was hoping to catch and Um, I know I won't get them all, but if I can catch a finish great and shout out someone special in my life, I do always want to make that effort.
I love all the people that finish and throw heart hands up my way.
It's so special.
I don't generally go down to the finish line unless there is a like super important reason.
And so this year, uh, there were two.
One is I knew I was going to want to be down there for Jackie.
And in the days leading up to Boston, I was texting with Chris Lotzbaum.
I should have made sure it was OK to share this.
Ask forgiveness, not permission.
If I'm not in Boston next year, it's because I overshared.
And I hope my absence will be noticeable from the family.
So.
Chris and I had been texting and I was like hey, I'm putting people in my tracker and we always put the notables in there.
Right.
So that we can catch their finishes.
Sonny Williams, Dave McGilvery, Zidane O'Chara.
We want to make sure that we get them.
And so I was like hey, you know, we knew Chelsea Clinton was running the race and she was not in the tracker.
She runs under an alias for safety and security reasons.
And I was like do you want?
I was like, you know, if you want us to shout her out, if you can share her bib with me, and if she wants to finish under the radar, let me know.
Like either way, let me know.
And we will accommodate whatever there in your preferences.
And Chris responded and was like, Here's her bib number.
Obviously, don't share it with anyone.
And he was like, her team asked if you would be at the finish.
And I responded like I ha ha the message like, LOL, Chris.
And he was like, no, seriously.
And I was like, tell me verbatim what this exchange was.
I want to know every detail.
And he was.
I guess they had said, you know asked does Chelsea want to plan to do media at the finish?
And I think their response was along the lines of no, we're not going to do media like she's.
She's going to see her parents there.
But if Ali's there, she might want to talk to Ali.
And I responded and said, excuse me while I pass away.
So that's how this all came to be.
Apparently her team brought me up.
Um, I like, I don't even know.
I don't even know.
Chelsea's been on the show now twice.
Cause we did record this week and her episode will be out before this one.
And so you will have already heard it.
But yeah, I guess her team remembers me and knows i'm at finishes and you know i was there in new york, and so they mentioned me by name.
And then at one point during race week, it was mentioned to me that i might be giving chelsea her medal and of course i'm like whoa, like that's cool and crazy.
So they had me.
They were like when she's close, like when Chelsea's about to be on Boylston or something come down.
And so TK knew and they were like, come down and we'll have this all, you know, play out.
And they I mean they've rehearsed, they had done walkthroughs with security.
Like this stuff is buttoned up.
And so I came down and was told that I was going to be.
My role was going to be greeting Chelsea at the finish.
So her mom and dad.
President Bill Clinton and, Madam Secretary, should have been President Hillary Clinton.
They were there, but they were just past the photo bridge.
So they weren't like. right at the finish line for her to fall into their arms.
In New York, they're like right at the finish here.
They were back a little bit.
I'm sure a lot went into that decision.
And so my job was to greet Chelsea at the finish and then escort her to her parents, who I met before Chelsea finished.
When I first went down there, they brought me over to Bill and Hillary, and I gave them the medal that they would then give Chelsea.
So I got to hand a medal.
I handed it to Bill.
And this is the part that I wish.
This is the number one part of the weekend I wish I could redo is I wish I had said Hi, I'm Allie, because I've met Hillary now a couple times.
I've never met Bill.
I've met her a few times, but there are so many people.
Runners were, guys, I love you, but I'm not going to lie.
I was like a little horrified at times.
People were running right up to them and just like snapping selfies with them.
Like it felt so invasive and there's so much security.
So it's like, it is very, you know, it's controlled, but like, I don't, it was wild.
Like they were.
Not again, not mobbed because they were very much protected and you can't touch them.
But anyway, I wish that I had just like done that interaction a little bit differently and said you know, I'm Allie.
It's so good to see you.
So excited for Chelsea.
And instead, I was just like, I didn't even introduce myself.
I was just like, what do you think of all this?
And Bill was like, it's really great.
And Hillary was like, well, we've been in New York.
And I was like, yeah, I was like, New York is so different.
I was like, how does this compare?
And it was just like very brief, small talk.
I gave them the medal and was like, you know, so glad you're both here.
It was super brief.
It was a very brief interaction.
I didn't ask them for a photo.
The photo that I posted was.
I think Celia took that photo, Celia from the BAA, who like hell of a day for Celia.
First Boston, you get to meet a former president and first lady.
That's not a bad day at the office.
And she just like snapped a couple pictures.
So we're not posing like you can tell that Hillary's talking in the pictures.
But I was like, I'll take it.
It's.
It's a picture of me and them and that's awesome.
So so yeah, I came down.
Chelsea and her friend Jen finished the race and the media swarms them again.
It's controlled like the media they are.
The photographers are so good and professional.
There's not like at least not that I can see, it's not like.
There's like shoving.
This isn't paparazzi, but there's a lot of them.
And so you can see in some of the videos, Chris Lotzbaum is like holding everyone back and I'm walking with Chelsea.
And again, my job was to walk with her back to show her where her parents are.
But again, I'm like I watched the video back and I'm like, oh, my God, Allison, shut up.
Like I'm like asking her all about the race because I was so excited.
She was bleeding.
And so I asked what happened.
And I'm like, what did you think?
She said she ran a PR like we're just chatting.
But I wish that I had just said like your parents are right there.
And then just like backed away, but also like, and again, I'm being very hard on myself.
She was excited to talk about her race.
She wasn't like, get out of my face.
She knew who I was, but yeah, I don't know.
Like what a cool honor.
What a cool thing to get to do like a teeny tiny role on race day, but it was very exciting.
And so then she goes back and then I just totally backed away.
Again, the media, they wanted to get the pictures, the videos.
I didn't want to be in the background of them.
So I just backed away.
They eventually get the Clintons away safely and get them where they need to go.
And I was just like recapping it all with the BAA team before I went back up on the bridge to rejoin TK.
And I was like, that was awesome.
That was crazy.
That was so cool.
And then I literally look up and there's Laura Green, which I knew, because obviously I was tracking her and I knew that she was really close to where Chelsea was.
And I think they had like yo-yoed a bit on the course.
And then again, I wasn't on my phone.
Like, I don't even know if I brought my phone down with me.
So I wasn't able to see how close she was.
And she just like appeared.
And so that was exciting to get to be down there and see her finish and, you know, celebrate with her for a couple seconds.
It's all the interactions on race.
They are so brief.
They're meaningful, but they're so brief.
And.
The other thing I will say is I feel so bad and I probably say this every year but like when I'm at the finish, I'm working.
I either have an earpiece in or I'm supposed to be up on the bridge announcing.
And so I don't get to take pictures with people.
And I felt so bad because I was trying to get back up on the bridge because TK has been announcing by himself for like 10 minutes now.
And I was like, I got to go back to work.
And people are so nice and they're so excited and want to take pictures.
And so I'm so sorry if all I did was congratulate you and like pat you on the back.
But um, hopefully people understand that I am, I am working and I trust me.
I would love to just be a professional greeter.
Don't get me wrong.
I love what I do but like I think I would be great at just like high-fiving people, greeting people, shooting the shit, hearing about your race, but we have to keep things moving.
Um, I have to do the job I'm there to do.
It's very important to me, um, and to the people who hire me.
So I did feel bad.
There were a But, I mean, it really did just feel like a special day.
I feel like everyone was coming across the line being like, I ran a PR, I ran a PR, I ran a PR.
Obviously, the pro races were so fast.
One moment that was really special that I got to witness was –
John career had finished and he ran a course record and then Sharon finished and won.
And when Sharon and John saw each other, she was like, you won.
And he was like, you won.
And then he goes, I ran a course record.
And she started just like freaking out and they were hugging.
And I happened to be standing right there.
I think because I was, in my position ready to interview Sharon or both of them.
And getting to see two pros celebrate each other like that is fun, because also when the pros get to the line they don't know how the race ahead of them played out.
And so it's fun seeing people finish.
Like right before this, I watched Clayton Young's recap of the weekend, which is so good.
You should definitely watch it on YouTube.
And he finishes and he asks his people, Ashley and Coach Ed Eyestone.
He's like, where did I place?
And they're like, you were 11th.
And he's like, oh, man, like just out of the top 10.
But he was happy with his time.
And so they don't know when they get to the line.
Like they don't know who won or if records were set or.
Yeah, the American women finish and jess mclean started it and she did it last year too.
She finishes, she is the top american, she has every reason to jump up and down celebrate, go wild bask in that moment for herself.
And that woman turns around and she stands there and she greets every finisher after her not every finisher because she'd be there.
She'd still be there, you know uh, But she waits, and especially the camaraderie among the American women.
Like, yeah, they want to all be top American.
They all want to run their best race.
They want to run the best race.
The way that they celebrate each other at the finish line is incredible.
I don't know.
I haven't watched the ESPN feed, so I don't know if they showed that.
Hopefully they did.
It is a really special moment.
And then Clayton Young does the same thing.
Clayton finishes his race and he always stands at the finish and high fives the guys that come in right after him.
It's really cool.
I just the sportsmanship is really wonderful.
I did get to see.
Tommy Rivers Poozy this year.
I love seeing Tommy Rives finish.
He's just like, he's done so much in this world.
He's done so much for the running community.
He has lived through some shit and he's just someone who I love seeing at the finish.
And um, he was with an older gentleman that it looked like he had uh, helped to the finish a bit and I didn't want to interrupt that, so I gave him like a super quick hug and then he kept walking with his uh, what I think was a new friend and that was a special moment to get to see.
I'll tell you, doesn't matter who wins this race, doesn't matter who does what, Des Linden is getting the loudest cheers of the day.
At the finish line, Dez finished and the crowd goes absolutely wild for her.
It was really cool because she was in the pack this year.
Seeing all the runners around her who were clearly excited to be running near Dez, just like giving her a high five, was really fun.
You can tell Dez eats it up like she loves it.
She, she loves Boston and Boston loves her, and It was fun to get to see her and her husband Ryan give each other their medals.
I loved that moment.
I got to see both the Megs finish.
I was up on the photo bridge, but Meg Murray and Meg Featherston, they're always so fun coming across.
One of my favorite parts of the day was seeing my loved ones being so into it.
My parents had me come over on Tuesday night because they just wanted to recap the weekend with me.
And so I sat in my parents living room on Tuesday night and we just talked about Boston and, like the way that my parents now know stats and know storylines,
And it's just like.
Like, that's so awesome.
Like we got some new fans of the sport and oh yeah.
I mean, Dee, I think cried the whole day.
Every time I looked down, Dee was crying.
She just loved it.
It was her first year.
She's watched, she's lived in Boston for a long time.
She's in Rhode Island now, but lived in Boston.
The Boston Marathon has always been special for her.
She always goes out for it.
But I know that getting to be at the finish was really cool for her and she was just like loving it.
I missed a handful of the people in my tracker, but I also got to see a lot of the people.
I will say I definitely noticed that there were six waves this year.
So the BAA knew this year, instead of four waves at the start, they had six.
And I felt I'm curious about the runner experience, but um, I think that the finish line definitely felt less crowded this year.
There wasn't significant bottlenecking.
Everything seemed really smooth.
I say it every year, the Boston marathon medical team is insane.
They and my family comments on this too.
Like someone's eyes start to roll back in the head and they are there to catch that person.
Like they appear out of nowhere.
Not only are they so fast and efficient for people who are requiring medical help, they're so compassionate and empathetic.
There was this one guy and every time he would go and save someone, He was like, you're okay.
We're here with you.
We've got you.
Like he was so encouraged.
He wasn't just like, oh, another patient for us to wheel off to medical.
Like he, oh my gosh, they were.
So good.
And I.
We talked about it last year and I didn't make it happen in time.
But I will get the one of the medical directors on for an episode, because I'm dying to know more about how they do their jobs, and they do it so beautifully and efficiently and safely.
They are a lot of heroes of the day, but they're one of them.
Oh, oh, I saw the flyover.
I almost always miss the flyover, but this year I saw it.
I saw it at the last second.
I heard it coming and I like popped my head out of the photo bridge and I saw it at the last second.
Everyone's filming themselves at the finish line now.
This is not a Matt Choi thing.
Matt Choi, I saw finish and he was filming himself with his phone, but he didn't stand out more than any other runner. finishing that race, holding their phone up.
It does feel like it's almost everyone at this point.
And like, this is where I say, do you, if that's important to you, go for it.
Just have awareness of the people around you and don't impede on anyone else's experience.
You know, it's your day too.
And I want people to have that moment.
There were two women who I watched walk.
They finished, but they wanted to get a photo right at the finish line.
And they walked back and pretended to cross it again to take pictures.
And I was about to lose my mind.
I hate that.
I'm sorry.
I hate it. there are 30 000 runners you cannot go back and re-cross the finish line for your photo op you just can't there's too many people and if everyone does that like and i wish i do wish more people thought that way on these big weekends of like i think so often we think well there's 30 000 so if just i do this no one's gonna notice but what if 30 000 people did that like then it is a problem and so Is it a huge deal?
No, but also, like I was so stressed watching that happen, because also other people are trying to finish and they're having to like weave around these people who are posing, and they did eventually get pulled.
If like, you can't do that,
So yeah, just.
Just be aware.
Obviously, cousin Jackie's finish was like such a highlight for me of you know, getting to be there, getting to see our loved ones in the stands.
Like my parents, Neil, Dee, they were all there cheering Laura.
They were all there cheering for her as she came in and she ran right into my arms.
She ran a PR and we talk about it in her recap.
So I don't need to go into it more here.
But like all I wanted was for her to have a great experience.
It was her first Boston training had been tough.
Her body had been cooperating, obviously, for so many.
The weather made it a really tough winter to train in.
And I just wanted her to have an amazing experience.
And so to get to see her at the finish and I've been tracking her so I could tell she was having a good day and she didn't have a goal time.
But like she ran so well,
And so to get to see her happy at the finish was just like that felt like a gift.
Another thing that I really appreciated on Marathon Monday was that I'm just another person at the finish.
And I know I just shared all the cool experiences I got to have, but I was feeling a little overexposed in the earlier days of Boston weekend.
People have been so nice to me over the past year especially, and so kind.
And then the program and the Boston Globe.
I got into this job because I want to ask the questions.
I want to tell other people's stories.
This was never supposed to be about me.
Going into Boston.
A lot of it felt like it was a Not the Boston Marathon was about me, but I was very aware that I was very out there.
And it was amazing.
And there were times where I was I don't know if I was uncomfortable or uneasy, or I would just immediately change the subject and be like but how are you doing?
Like deflecting, I guess.
And then on race day I felt so anonymous and I was just like this day is so about the 30000 runners.
It's not about, you know, and I saw discussion in various places.
I consume a lot.
And so, you know, I saw people saying stuff like I hope I don't see any influencers in Boston.
They'll ruin the experience for me.
And on race day, like, and look, I have a bird's eye view to all of it.
And no one stands out more than anyone else.
Like, yes, Yuki Chorny stands out.
She is literally dressed like a showgirl unicorn wearing Yuki stands out with all the best energy in the world.
But like it is about the runners,
It is so about the community.
It is about the professional athletes.
It is about the athletes at the back of the path.
Like it just felt so good to be reminded of all the reasons that I love to do this.
And you all are that reason.
Um, I don't, I don't need anything more than what I'm getting in spades.
I love getting to be there for your moments.
And so it was such a good reminder of that, of of what it's all about.
Like there is no main character on race day.
Race day is about all of us.
And and that's the runners.
That's the community.
That's the spectators.
That's the volunteer.
Like it's it's a team sport.
It's a community effort.
And you just feel that on race day.
And I really felt that this year.
It the obviously the weather is a main character, but it just it felt like a really good day.
Felt really good.
And then all good things must come to an end.
So this year we got the call.
We were we were supposed to be done at 530 is the official finish time.
And then at some point we got a call.
TK said to me, he was like, we're done at 536.
My guess is that it took six minutes for the final call runner in wave six to cross the start line because they I believe I should know that it's six hours from the time the final runner crosses the start line, and so my guess is that that had happened at.
You know, 06 36.
No, it would have been 36, right?
11 36.
I need help.
Uh, so we were there until exactly five 36.
So please know that like we do that six hour cutoff.
We do take that seriously and we honor that.
And so at five thirty six, we put our microphones down and slowly backed away and said bye and thanked everyone.
And so I was going to go back to my room.
I was going to eat something and then I was going to go to the pro athlete party, which it's a quick turnaround.
The shuttles for the party start leaving the hotel at six.
And so I was like, oh man, like I'm not going to have much time, but I was starving.
And so I walked back to the hotel with TK.
We debriefed the day.
We're both like really, really happy.
We're not tired yet.
We're just like happy.
And I go back and I see a group of people in the lobby having champagne, which I loved.
And it was Emily Sisson and Callie Hogger Thackeray.
She I don't think was having champagne.
No judgment.
She's 22 weeks pregnant.
No judgment.
And Alice.
OK, Bakwe.
I hope I'm saying that right.
Alice and I had never met before.
She's a Pilates instructor in Flagstaff.
Oh my God, I'm obsessed with her.
She was lovely, wonderful, gorgeous, funny, charming, all the things.
And so I was just chatting with them and I didn't know, I knew Emily was the third American.
I didn't know.
And you don't know if people are happy with their race.
Like, did you want more?
Are you satisfied?
I don't know.
I haven't read.
I haven't seen any of the post-race coverage yet.
And so I just asked Emily, I was like, how did it go?
And she was like, it was great.
She was happy, which I'm so happy to hear.
I did get to see her husband Shane for a little bit.
And Emily was on her phone booking a flight.
She was supposed to fly back to Ireland the next day, but she was like, I'm going to join.
Like Shane was flying out that night.
She was like, I think I'm going to fly back with him.
And I was like, first of all, booking a flight on your phone is wild behavior.
I've never done that.
That's a big screen task.
Never booked a flight on a phone, but she was doing it.
And I was like, well, I hope you're booking yourself a nice lay down seat for that flight.
Like if you're going to splurge tonight's the night you deserve it.
And I think it was Alice that was like, just show them your metal and hopefully they'll upgrade you.
And Emily goes, I didn't get a metal.
And Callie was like, you didn't get a medal.
And Emily was like, did you?
And Callie was like, yeah, I got a medal.
And Emily was like, oh, I didn't.
And I just looked at her and I go, Emily, do you want a medal for finishing the Boston Marathon?
And she was like, I kind of do.
And I was like, I will be right back.
And I think.
Forget the Clintons.
This was the most baller I felt all weekend because I just knew that if I went into the media center at that time in the day, I knew there would be BAA staff members in there.
And those are the people you ask.
And so I was like, I will be right back.
And so I just went in.
And Chris was in there, and Celia was in there and Chris's amazing wife, Elena was in there, who also works with me.
Like the exact right people were in there.
And I was like, hey, I was like, Emily Sisson's in the lobby.
She didn't get a medal.
I was like, is there any chance there's a medal in here that you could give to her?
And they're like.
Done.
And so sweet Elena was like, I will be right back.
She runs, comes back with a medal, hands it to me.
And it's like, there you go.
And so I, and this was all maybe within like a three minute span.
And so I walked over to Emily Sisson and I was like, here's your medal.
And I got to give her her medal.
And she was so grateful and appreciative and like took a picture with it.
And she was like, how'd you do that?
And I was like, don't worry about it.
I felt like someone who gets shit done.
And it was really just because I knew what to do with that specific request.
Most other things I would have been like, I don't know who to ask or I'm not sure where to go.
I would have figured it out.
But that was really like, I was like, oh, I feel like I pulled through and.
She did get upgraded on her flight.
I don't know if it was because of the metal, but I do believe it all worked out brilliantly for sweet Emily Sisson.
So I go back to my room.
I immediately order in-room dining and I had been texting with Kara Goucher of like how was the show?
How's your day going?
And she had just recorded her recap with Des and she was eating and she was like I'll, I'm heading back to the hotel and I was like great.
I was like I'm ordering dinner, do you want anything?
I'm also gonna get a drink, like I.
I was just in the mood for like a nice little little nightcap.
Before I was gonna go out, she was like I'll have whatever you're having, and so I order.
And I was like two espresso martinis.
And they were like, do you want Bailey's in it?
And I was like, is I don't know.
Never been asked that.
I was like, however you make them.
And they were like, yeah, usually with Bailey's.
I said, sounds great.
And I texted Kara back and was like, room 227.
And she was like, are you kidding?
She's like, I'm 229.
We had been right next to each other the whole weekend.
Had no idea.
And so she comes in.
At this point, I'm obviously in sweatpants and very comfy.
The food arrives, drinks arrive and we're just sitting on the bed yapping non-stop.
It was I don't want to say the worst, but the least good espresso martini I've ever had it.
Kara had never had one, so I was excited to introduce her to espresso martinis and she was like this isn't it.
But we drank them and then we ordered another round without Bailey's, and that was so good.
Actually, I don't think Kara got another one, but I did.
So anyway, I ended up not going to the party.
Kara and I just sat and hung out all night, and it was the most perfect way to end the most perfect weekend.
Just girl talk, shooting the shit, some light gossip.
It was awesome.
I was sad I never made it out to any of the parties, but also I was right where I wanted to be.
And I think that was the takeaway from my entire weekend is everywhere that I was, I felt like I was right where I wanted to be.
I was right where I should be.
And I was just, I was so happy.
So awesome.
Congratulations, runners.
I mean, it was a banner day in Boston.
So many of you ran so well.
If you didn't have the race of your dreams, there will be more.
And you should be really proud of whatever you did.
And of course, to everyone in a supporting role, awesome job.
You nailed it, probably.
Hopefully, if you didn't, you better make up for it.
But seriously, it was such a special day in Boston and I loved getting to be a part of it.
How long is this recap?
Are you still here?
So I went to bed late, late, late on Monday, like 1230 a.m., but just happily.
Uh, and then of course my body woke me up at five 30 the next morning.
I had no alarm set.
I was like, I can sleep as late as I need to.
Like the only thing I have to do on Tuesday is go home.
And my body woke me up at five 30.
So I packed up the room.
I edited the Claire episode, or I listened back to it.
I think I had already uploaded it.
I edited Eric and Aisha's episode, like I just got into work mode and then, once Jackie was up and moving, she came over and we laid in bed and we recorded her race recap, which was fun.
It was just nice to like relive the weekend and the day with her.
And then she left and then I was sad.
And so I went out and I ran five miles around the Charles.
And again, the day after the marathon is so quiet on the river.
I don't even remember if I saw anyone I knew.
Oh, the other thing was at the finish line, they have a DJ there.
On race day until a certain hour and then it switches over and it's a playlist and that the DJ makes.
But it's just a playlist versus when the DJ is there and you know can take requests, and it's always the same DJ and he's my guy and there was no love story this year.
And all of a sudden I'm like
I see that he's packing up and I'm like, you didn't play my song.
And he's like, oh shoot, sorry.
And I'm like, can you play it now?
And he was like, my stuff's packed up.
Like I can't.
And I was like, oh my God.
Like I didn't get to hear it from Chris Capozzi the day before and then didn't get it at the finish.
Like that is literally always my favorite moment of race day is when they play my finish line song.
And so I didn't get to hear it.
So I finished my run and I was like, oh, I want to go take a picture of the finish.
And at that point, the finish line is barricaded off.
So now we're on Tuesday now and you can't get close to it because they're already breaking it down.
Like it is wild how quickly they get the city back to normal.
But I hear love story and I look around and I'm like, you've got to be shitting me.
Like I was sad two days in a row.
And now, at the exact moment I'm walking past the finish line as it's being broken down, I hear my song.
And there was a man standing in front of the church that's right at the finish playing Love Story and sort of singing along to it.
And I stood there and I filmed it and I was so happy.
I was so happy.
It was amazing.
And it was just like, of course, this is how the weekend ended.
So much better.
Then getting hit by a turkey on the highway on the way home, which did not happen this year.
So I broke the streak two years in a row of my windshield being shattered.
Two years ago, it was a turkey.
And last year, something flew into my windshield on the way to Boston.
And my car was only five days old.
I was not happy about that.
I've been through so many windshields in the past few years, which that should be a write off.
That should be workers comp.
No, I'm just kidding, Boston.
I'm just kidding.
So, yeah, I got to see a man performing a live rendition of Love Story, went back.
And as I was walking down to my car with my 900 bags and my vibration plate, which I brought with me,
I saw Celia, Chris and Elena from the BAA.
And that also just felt perfect.
Like they're I work so closely with them.
They've done so much to support me.
Chris is definitely like my number one guy that I work so closely with in Boston.
And so felt fitting to see them on the way out.
So, yeah.
You know what else is that?
When I was in Chicago, which was a big deal, and even in New York I got a lot of the sympathetic head nods, a lot of like, how are you doing?
Whereas this one was just like, oh my god, hi.
It felt so different.
And I do know a part of that is because I'm done with chemo.
I'm still in active treatment.
I don't feel great.
My body just like hurts.
Side effects of all my medications and everything are just like bone pain, joint pain.
And I'm feeling all of it.
I'm like a little creaky, but it's fine.
It's nothing compared to what chemo feels like.
And so this weekend definitely felt felt like myself.
I felt like coming home.
I felt a lot of unity from the community.
Community.
Let's end there.
No notes, nothing further to say.
I'm going to be stressed about how many people I forgot to mention or neglected to mention, or whatever.
But just know that if I saw you in Boston, whether we hugged and spent time together, or saw each other from afar and gave heart hands, or saw each other in passing on the run, like every interaction is genuinely so meaningful to me.
And these are my absolute favorite weekends.
So.
Hoping to keep riding this high.
Whoo.
Some people ran the marathon faster than I just took to talk about it.
So thank you so much for being here for this solo episode of the alley on the run show, recapping.
My experience at the 2026 Boston Marathon and beyond.
Hey, if you made it to the end, you're amazing.
Thanks for being here.
Thanks for sticking around.
I truly had the best time, and I say it every time.
But these are really just little time capsules for me and I love trying to document everything, so I remember it and remember all the special moments.
Thank you for being a part of the special and magical moments.
These weekends wouldn't be what they are without all of you.
And so thank you for coming to the live shows.
Thank you for showing up for me.
Thank you for showing up for yourselves and for each other.
We really did get to see the best of humanity on Monday and the entire weekend.
So many moments at the finish line of runners helping each other, picking each other up.
Just it's the Catherine Switzer quote.
It really is.
If you are losing faith in human nature, go out and watch a marathon, and I am continually losing faith in human nature in 2026 and you are all continually reminding me and showing me that the good is out there and it is truly more impactful than the bad.
So keep that shit up.
Keep showing up for each other.
Keep being the good.
Thank you so much to Viore for supporting this episode.
Viore.com slash on the run is going to get you 20% off your next Viore order.
The Villa Wide Leg Pants are my absolute favorite.
Until next time, you've got this.
You're doing great.
And thank you for joining me on the run.
