Fit Fanatic: Watching Your Coach WIN the Mankato Marathon!

By Jess

Wow...where was this AWESOME picture taken? 

Read on to find out!

After hosting a post-marathon potluck last night for my run club girlfriends (read about it HERE), we were up bright and early to drive to Mankato to cheer for the marathoners at the Mankato Marathon.

After a quick stop for some extra large coffees at Starbucks (the potluck went a little late, and we were all tired), we hit the road to Mankato. Mankato is about 1.5 hours southwest of Minneapolis.

This is a relatively new marathon for our state; I think it's only the third year. Yet even though it is new, the post-marathon comments were mostly positive- very well organized, pretty course, but it had some challenging hills and limited spectators.

Website: http://www.mankatomarathon.com

When I run a marathon, I LOVE the fans and their funny, slightly offensive signs.
So my friends and I put together some of our own for our cheering squad.

 I did get yelled at by one ornery runner. 

Have a sense of humor, grumpers! 

At least most of the runners seemed to get a chuckle out of our signs.

We had cowbells and music, and definitely were some of the loudest cheerleaders! 

At our first spectator  stop, we were all so excited to see that our coach was in the lead!

And he wasn't just part of a leading pack. He was the lead runner by a significant margin!

When we saw him again at mile 10, his lead had only increased, and he was looking so strong!

When we saw him at mile 21, it was obvious that he had a marathon WIN in the bag.

It was so amazing to personally know and care for the person who was winning the marathon!

And then an even more amazing thing happened....

...two of our friends went to the bathroom at Burger King!!!

Amazing, right?

Okay, no, that's not it.

The amazing thing that happened was that while they were heading back from the bathroom, these two friends ran into the driver of the lead runner vehicle, and the two of them turned on their Minnesota charm, and were able to convince the driver to let us all hop in the back of the truck to cheer for Coach Paul as he came through to the finish line.

{in the back of the lead runner vehicle - what an AMAZING experience!}

It was so much fun to share this experience with my run club friends, and to view the race from this spectacular vantage point. It was probably a once-in-a-lifetime experience for most of us.

But as fun as it was for us to cheer from the lead runner vehicle, it was probably a lot more fun for Coach Paul; I mean, he was WINNING! What an amazing feeling that must have been!

We all felt so proud of Paul!

We know just how hard he worked, and he deserved to win.

Congratulations!

After Paul's amazing finish, we headed back to mile 21 to cheer some more, and we were able to catch these strong runners:

Go Angela!

 Still smiling at mile 21!

Looking good Mat!

After cheering for our friends, we met up with the Mankato Marathon Winner (yeah, I know him) at Pub 500 for some grub.

{Don't you love the big face sign?}

After lunch, we went to the awards ceremony to watch Paul accept his trophy.

A huge congratulations again Coach! So amazing!