8 was the Ellerbe Springs Marathon, 6 April 2002.
This was supposed to be a training run for the Vermont City Marathon coming up in May, which I never actually ran. I drove to Ellerbe from Durham, leaving at 4:20 am and arriving at 6, bit too early. Getting dressed to run in the showers at the campground at Ellerbe Springs I met John from Minneapolis, who turned out to be one of the 400 members of my graduating class at Macalester.
I ran the race with John, chatting about Minnesota tales old and new, until 20 miles. We passed the half at exactly 2 hours and were at 3:06 at 20 miles. I decided to see what I had left and finished in 3:57.43. John came in easy at 4:18. Drove back home, finished strong, feel pretty good, it was great day to run. (Temperature reached maybe 60).