BOZEMAN — What do you do when you’ve trained years to run the Boston Marathon, you qualify and then it gets postponed until September? Well, you run the half-marathon called the Boz-ton, right in the city of Bozeman.
Meredith Johnson and Kendice Rollison are running partners, inspiring each other to achieve their dream of running in the Boston Marathon.
“For five years on Fridays, long run Fridays is what we call it," said Rollison. "We make sure our schedules work around long run Friday and together we’ve made this goal."
This year, they accomplished their goal and qualified for the Boston Marathon. For Rollison, it’s something she has been dreaming of for years. Her father was a five-time participant.
“Running fast enough to get there is not easy," Rollison said, holding back tears. "It’s been many years running, trying and to finally make it was so emotional and so exciting.”
Due to the COVID-19 shutdown, the race has been postponed until September.
“We had already trained for two months, like we had already been doing our 23 miles or 20-mile runs," Johnson said. "So you’re just devastated."
The two women never imagined a pandemic would come in the way of them and their goal.
“You go through so much hard work training for it, the last thing you think is it will be postponed due to a pandemic," said Rollison.
“We weren’t going to let the opportunity pass us to celebrate them today even if it does mean we have to be six feet a part, “ said neighbor Abby Allen.
Qualifying for the Boston Marathon with your best friend and having support from your local community, life could always be worse.
“In the roller coaster of all of this, I still feel very lucky,” said Johnson.
