2006 was a breakout year for Tom Storey, one of our Race with Purpose community’s most well-liked and talented runners. Last October, Tom was prepared, well trained and ready to accomplish his goal of running his best marathon and qualifying for Boston.

Alas, even with all of this effort, it wasn’t meant to be and while he PR’d, he missed qualifying by less than a minute. This was heart breaking to Tom after all of the 70+ mile weeks of running he put into his training. The weeks immediately following this bittersweet event were particularly challenging physically, emotionally and mentally. He was frustrated, dissapointed and physically broken down. Tom and I had numerous conversations about how he couldn’t even go out and finish a five-mile run without feeling too achy to continue.

During this period, I tried to encourage him by reminding him that he PR’d, he had an amazing season and that it was completely natural to have peaked for his “A” race, and now needed an appropriate time for his body to repair and recover. While this made perfect sense rationally to Tom, I sensed that it didn’t make him feel any better. Typical of Tom, however, a few weeks later, Tom was out there on the ING NYC Marathon course running back and forth on 5th Avenue encouraging his teammates to run up those final hills and run their own best marathon.

Still in the back of Tom’s mind was the fact that while his 2006 season was amazing by every standard, he didn’t get across his own personal finish line, the outcome goal he set of qualifying for Boston.

This past winter, Tom quietly rededicated himself to this goal, building off all of the accomplishments of his 2006 season, including showing up to the Boston Build-up races after pulling all nighters at work. This past Sunday at the Rock ‘N Roll Marathon in San Diego, Tom crossed his finish line by finishing in 3:19:47 and qualifying for a spot in the 2008 Boston Marathon. Tom’s performance on Sunday adds him the the growing list of Race with Purpose athletes that have achieved this distinction. Tom’s efforts should remind us that we all stumble and it’s what we do afterwards that defines who we really are.

Please join me in congratulating a great runner and an even better friend. Way to go Tom!

From: Tom Storey [mailto:storeyt@us.ibm.com]
Sent: Sunday, June 03, 2007 10:02 PM
Subject: MY Boston Qualifier
Well,

I’m pretty tired right now as I ran the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon this morning in perfect June Gloom (which cleared into a beautiful day right after I finished) and finished in 3:19:47 which qualifies me to run the Boston Marathon (with 1:12 to spare )

It wasn’t the best race for me with respect to split times but I got the job done and felt good enough this afternoon to go walk around the SD Zoo for about three hours.

Talk to you all next week,

Tom