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YOU BETTER RUN – Welp, let’s try this again.
Apparently the Boston Athletic Association search page wasn’t fully cooperative with a certain blockhead who was looking up past Boston Marathon results last Monday and failed to find Dan Larson’s finish times from 2021 and 2022.
So while posting his 2023 time of 4:23:43, I also concluded that his decades-long streak of Boston finishes had ended and misreported that. On the bright side, my blunder afforded another opportunity to chat with one of my favorite Capital Region runners on Tuesday of this week, and the 72-year-old Scotia native and long-time Queensbury resident delivered the goods, as usual.
He ran his fastest time since 2017 and is already looking forward to going back next year to extend his remarkable streak of 48 straight Boston finishes and 53 of the 54 times he has started, including two races he ran remotely in 2020 and 2021 because of the pandemic.
“It was just a totally surprisingly good day for me, for reasons I can’t really explain,” Larson said. “Part of it is, being retired, that when the weather is right and the conditions are right I can train without worrying about being to work at a certain time or getting home and it’s pitch-black.”
That schedule flexibility, coupled with favorable weather, extended to one of Larson’s favorite activities, cross country skiing, which naturally brings crossover training and fitness benefits to his running.
Larson’s primary skiing spot was Garnet Hill Lodge in North Creek, but he also occasionally skied at Lapland Lake west of Northville.
“I didn’t have to wait until the weekend to get out there, so I did a lot of cross country skiing from around February 20th to March 31st,” he said. “In that six-week period, I did a lot of skis that were 20 kilometers.”
Last Monday at Boston, Larson enjoyed the dividends of his training and also the familiar rhythms and scenes he was first exposed to while running Boston as an undergraduate on the Yale University track and field team.
His old friend and teammate from Scotia-Glenville High School, Jim Forbes, didn’t run this year, but was on the course among the spectators with his grandchildren a short distance past where Larson’s wife Victoria was stationed at her usual spot at the halfway mark.
“I stop for a good minute and chat with my wife and friends at Wellesley; I soak it all in,” Larson said.
“I always try to take little special stuff from the little kids. It brings a big smile to their faces. There’s a place in Natick just before you hit Wellesley where these little kids — if there’s such a thing as a modest part of Natick — who are always out with these ice pops cut in half, and I always stop and take one personally from each of several different kids.
“So I said to the woman supervising them, trying to keep them from getting trampled, ‘Thank you, I look forward to this every year.’ Just the beam on their faces. That kind of stuff just makes the day worthwhile. I’m not setting [personal] records anymore, so you might as well enjoy the moments.”
One of those moments, of course, came at the finish line, when he recorded his fast time and immediately was flooded with congratulatory texts.
According to his Strava app, Larson actually ran six-tenths of a mile longer than the 26.2 marathon distance, which he guesses is attributable to diverging from the tangents used to measure the course while he was weaving through crowds and zig-zagging to say hi to his wife and friends.
“My first 5k was fast, and I thought, ‘Uhhhh … is this a good thing or a bad thing?’” Larson said.
The 2023 race marked the 10-year anniversary of the terrorist bombing near the Boston finish line.
Larson had already finished that year and was at the Park Plaza bar when the news came out. Last Monday, there were articles marking the occasion in the Boston papers and some ceremonial acknowledgement of the victims and survivors, but out on the course, Larson said it was just another typical Boston.
“You have to have some semblance of normalcy and appreciate the joy of an occasion,” he said. “The people in Boston were so great after the bombing. It’s a small thing compared to what people in New York City did after 9-11, but it’s a similar thing. People were kind to each other and kind to strangers, and were supportive.”
Among the texts Larson received last Monday was one from the legendary Frank Shorter, whom Larson said he knows through college connections.
“He sent me a text before the race, something like, ‘Good luck,’ and he sent me one afterwards,” Larson said. “He’s not verbose on emails and texts and said, ‘How ya doin’?’ I said, ‘Sore and happy,’ and he said, ‘Nuff said.’
“My wife always says, ‘Gee, you should retire after a good year. Just hang it up with a big smile on your face.’ But I think I’m going to persevere until I can’t.
“I love exercising outdoors, but I don’t have the focus to train for the marathon, per se, I don’t have the drive to do the long runs. But I still love my little local 5 and 10k races, and I love the tradition of Boston, I love the Troy Turkey Trot. And I love competing, even if I lose and don’t do well.”
Larson believes his good day last week was bolstered by an intake of over 1,000 calories during the race, via nutrition gels, a custom-made Gatorade knockoff that Victoria supplies at mile 13 and … Lifesavers.
I took a wild stab and guessed butter rum: “Butter rum, how did you know that? And they’re impossible to find. You could get them at the Albany-Rensselaer train station. My wife orders me a package online every year for the holidays.”
Not long after we got off the phone, Larson sent me this email:
“I want to add a few blessings from the long haul in Boston. Besides knowing Frank Shorter, I have had a number of other privileges
“Ron Hill from England won the first Boston I ever ran in 1970. I got to know him when I spent 4 months in Scotland in 1974.
“I knew John A Kelley, at least a little, who has completed more Bostons than anyone (58).
“I knew John J Kelley who won a couple of Bostons
“I am still friends with Amby Burfoot, the 1968 winner. He and I competed against each other when we lived in Connecticut. He ran 4hrs 40 min this year.
“In what other event do we “also rans” get to know the big shots?
“I am a lucky guy.
“Dan”
Contact Mike MacAdam at [email protected]. Follow on Twitter @Mike_MacAdam.
Categories: -Sports-, Email Newsletter, Scotia Glenville, Sports
