Boston Marathon Report: Danny McCormick

Danny McCormick recaps his weekend and day at the Boston Marathon. Watch the video above, or read his report here:

Residence

Greensboro

Age

46

Day job

Director of cost of care, Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina

Finishing time

3:09:04

How he qualified

Oak Island Marathon, 2:45, February 2021

Boston experience

Third Boston Marathon

Marathon experience

Fifth marathon

How it went

"It's one of those things where I didn't run the time I felt like I had on my legs with training. I came into this Boston probably the best-trained I'd ever come into a single Boston. Twenty-five minutes or so slower than my qualifying time was kind of tough, but it's Boston. Boston is a tough course. It's one of those courses if you don't run it right or don't run it well – I don't think I ran it smart three years in a row, but it's Boston. What can you say? The crowd's great, the feeling's great, the energy's great. When you come back into town, there's a whole lot of energy to it. It's hard to have a bad race, no matter what the clock says, when you're running in Boston.”

The challenging stretch

“I would say right around the halfway point. I probably went out too fast, or faster than I should have with all the downhill. Start getting tough between there and (Mile) 16. I told myself if I can just run smart through 16, I'll be OK. I should have pulled back a little bit more early on. Probably too much walking on the weekend trying to take it all in, too. ... Around mile 13, I knew that probably the wheels are going to come off the bus pretty soon. That's when it started getting a little difficult for me. And I still had the hills to go, too.”

Right on Hereford, left on Boylston

"Oh, God, relief, just knowing that you're almost done. You get a little motion when you see it; you hear about it all the time. When you run it, it's a different experience. It's like no matter how spent your legs are at the end, you always find more on that turn. You wished you could get it sooner. But there's a certain energy that says 'don't quit here, finish strong here.' It's a different experience; it's hard to put into words."

Moments that say 'Boston Marathon'

"The drastic change in the weather. It was kind of warm Saturday. And yesterday, it was crazy. It was so windy, so cold. At one point, we had sleet and snow coming down for a moment. And then today it was kind of cold. Got out to Hopkinton, sun coming down on the course, and it felt much warmer than 50 degrees. And then you get back into Boston, and you feel that wind again. It's the constant change in the weather. …

“That whole energy once you get off Heartbreak and you start coming back down that last five miles and having all the crowd lined up on the side. That was nice, just five miles left to go. For me, that defines Boston.”

How he's celebrating

"I'm going to stand in the shower for a while (laughs) and once I can get myself out, I'm probably going to look for a cheeseburger or something like that ... and be glad it's behind me. The marathon's fun, but there's nothing better than being done with a marathon, too."