Temperatures nearly reached 90 degrees for Monday’s 116th Boston Marathon, leading more than 4,000 of the nearly 27,000 registered runners to opt out of the 26.2-mile race.
But a few Flathead Valley runners persevered. Kalispell’s Casey Dunn clocked 3:21:14, placing 1,964th. Richard Briles from Kalispell finished in 3:54:59 and placed 7,491st. Kasey Young from Whitefish finished in 4:00:27, for 8,724th place. Jill Clark from Kalispell finished in 4:21:31, placing 13,631.
Devin Cowan from Helena was the top Montana finisher. He finished in 2:45:30 and placed 125th. Scott N. Sneddon from Billings finished in 2:50:46 for 217th place. Missoula’s Derek Kanwischer, 2:57:34, was 403rd. There were 68 runners from Montana registered in this year’s oldest annual marathon in the world.
Finishing this year’s race is especially impressive considering the scorching temperatures. According to a Los Angeles Times story, race organizers said more than 2,000 participants received some level of medical attention.
The temperatures even slowed down the Kenyans. A year after Kenya’s Geoffrey Mutai ran the fastest marathon in history, Wesley Korir became the 19th Kenyan in 22 years to win the men’s race, finishing in 2:12:40. Sharon Cherop, the third Kenyan woman to win in the past five years, clocked 2:31:50. Both were the slowest winning times since 1985.