Next Monday, 67 Needham residents from 18-71 years old plan to run the Boston Marathon. If they finish successfully, they will count themselves members of a very elite group: less than 0.2% of the world population has completed a marathon.
Many Needhamites have run this race before; others are trying for the first time. Their stories and their reasons for running are as varied as the towns along the marathon route.
Juliana Carvajal Castrillon, 32, is running her inaugural Boston marathon since moving to this country from Colombia six years ago to be a nanny and learn English. Back home, the outdoors was her passion, especially biking. The New England winters, however, shifted her focus. “I used to ride more than run, but when I came here I found the weather was not good for biking in the winter,” she said.
Juliana taught Spanish in the Watertown schools until she found her dream job as an outdoor learning guide for Intrepid Academy at Hale Reservation in Westwood. There, she works with kids, many from Boston, who don’t have access to outdoor spaces. She helps them with outdoor skills, mountain biking, hikes and running.
Along the way, she also met her dream life partner, an American ESL teacher in Stoughton. They married, moved to Needham and frequently run together in Cutler Park, which they call their backyard. For Juliana, running became a way to make local connections and develop community, especially with members of the Latino population. “I’m a volunteer at Latino Outdoors and I started running events with the Latino community. Some people never ran before and they are now running half miles. Sometimes you don’t know you are having such a big impact.”
Carvajal Castrillon’s marathon bib was made possible by the Boston Running Collaborative, a group committed to building a diverse running community. She’s also an ambassador for the outdoor brand Arcteryx. “Getting people into running is my ambition in life. You don’t need to run a marathon to be a runner. If you just move, you’re a runner.”
Michael Heier said while most kids who grow up here say they want to “run Boston,” he was the opposite. “I said I was never going to run. My neighbor Paul, a good friend, used to run all the time. I’d see him running by and I’d go, ‘what are you doing that for?’” Paul never did run a marathon but Heier started running at 47. Now 61 years old, he will be running his 15th marathon — his third Boston.
Heier originally started running with one of his sons. “Both of my kids ran cross country and track and I was thinking I should get in better shape. I wasn’t planning on marathons.” He started doing 5Ks, calling them “the gateway drug.”
Heier went on to complete marathons in Chicago and New York, eventually earning the Abbot World Majors medal in Tokyo in 2023. He is one of only three people in Needham running the Boston Marathon who have finished seven of the most prestigious marathons around the globe, in Boston, New York, Chicago, London, Berlin, Tokyo, and most recently, Sydney, Australia.
Throughout the years Heier learned each race is different and his response can vary. At the end of his very first race he discovered the minute he finishes his body seizes up. “You can’t believe that somehow you were just running because everything just stiffens up right away. I was in slow motion like the Tin Man.” In New York, runners are required to walk a mile after crossing the finish line, and he felt pretty good after that. “The key is not to stop. Any time I travel somewhere, I run and you really get a feel for the whole city. I can see a good amount of a city within an hour. If I was walking around like a tourist, it would take you much longer.”
Rachel Glazer, owner of Rachel G events, is running her 13th Boston and 33rd overall marathon. She was a basketball and lacrosse player in high school and started to run recreationally in college. Her first marathon was in New York in 1999, and since then she has run all types of marathons, big and small, and many in places far from home.
She has qualified for Boston in the past, but also runs for her favorite charities, including the Martin Richard Foundation, the Red Sox, and this year, the MGH Pediatric Cancer Center. In total, she said she has raised thousands of dollars to help people and organizations in need.Glazer’s marathon history was forever changed in 2013 in Boston, the year of the Marathon bombing. That year, she took a break from running to volunteer. She was announcing the names of finishers at the finish line. The thought that something bad would happen was far from her mind, even though she had run marathons many times in Israel during periods when bombing was a part of life.
“But you don’t think it will happen at the Boston Marathon,” she said. When the two bombs went off near the finish line, Glazer said there was chaos and she didn’t really know what was happening as volunteers and runners were frantically evacuated. “It was traumatizing and it comes to mind every marathon.” She knows every big city could be a target, but she said she tries not to let it get to her. She said she can’t get over what happened to Boston 13 years ago, but it doesn’t define her. She is and always will be a citizen of her beloved running community around the world and here at home.
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