Using various paths, Southwest Florida runners ready to tackle 128th Boston Marathon

The starter's gun for the 128th Boston Marathon will go off Monday morning.

The world's oldest annual marathon, having been held for the first time on April 19, 1897, is one of the most prestigious and hardest to gain entry.

Southwest Florida runners found their way in this year's event, whether by gaining the qualifying time for their age group or being a charity runner. Patti Shawber will be in the race celebrating its 100th year since moving its starting line to Hopkinton.

Shawber, 58, started running 10 years ago as a way to adapt to a healthy lifestyle. She recalls being at the gym for the first time with her boyfriend, now husband, and seeing a woman running on the treadmill. She describes how “out of shape and couldn’t breathe” she was when she was on the treadmill.

Despite this, she continued. “I’m always up for a challenge, she said.”

From treadmill to road running, a friend got her into her first marathon in 2017 in Baltimore. After that experience, she thought she'd never run again, but something inside her made her keep going.

Shawber of Fort Myers Beach eventually joined SpeedStriders, where she met Michael Suchan. It was there that the idea of qualifying for Boston came to fruition.

Suchan describes the idea of pursuing a qualifying time as something that comes with the territory when people in your running group are talking about it.

Shawber and Suchan, along with other members of the running group, ran the Cottonwood Marathon in Salt Lake City, Utah in September of 2023. It’s a downhill race course, part of the Revel series, and advertised as a Boston qualifier. Shawber qualified with a time of 3:56:26. She cried when she realized she had done it.

“I'm just not that good, but I did it,” said Shawber, who will be in Boston with her husband. “It’s the most prestigious race you have to earn a spot in.”

Her goal is simply to finish and get her Unicorn medal. She feels running has helped her self-esteem and is thankful to Suchan for his support.Suchan describes going to Boston as equivalent to “a stamp of approval of what you're doing” with your running and training. Suchan, 48, grew up in the Czech Republic and did the equivalent of cross-country running. He stopped at age 18 when he went to university. When he moved to the Fort Myers area, he started running again and eventually joined SpeedStriders. He was a novice runner, not knowing much, but gradually learned about proper running shoes and training.

He describes running his first half marathon, the Hooters Half, in 2015 without a running watch and ran a time of 1:47. One of his goals was to lose weight and stay healthy. He also enjoys the competitive side of running.

He ran his qualifying time at Tunnel Marathons in Washington state in August 2023 with a time of 3:19:26. Unfortunately, despite running his time, there were so many other qualifiers in his age group that he did not make the buffer needed to guarantee a spot in the face by running 5:29 faster than the listed time.

Suchan describes falling just short despite running the needed time as leaving a "bittersweet taste" that you are working for a superficial qualifying time and “have the rug pulled out from under you.” He understands that a qualifying time doesn’t necessarily guarantee a spot in Boston but plans to continue working towards that goal by making improvements in his training.

Also heading to Boston from SpeedStriders is Letty Lundquist, a 42-year-old mother, immigration attorney, and host of the Marathon Running Podcast. Lundquist started running at 22 and liked seeing the “mix of people of shapes and sizes who would run.”

She ran Boston in 2021 and felt drawn to it, describing it as a “celebration of community centered around the runners.” This will be her third Boston, also running last year. The Fort Myers resident felt the need to return "and be included in the community celebration. It keeps you hooked." Sandrine Eveque, 47, started running in 2009 because she felt she was overweight and had trouble losing weight with just gym workouts. The Fort Myers resident began running with one of her best friends who planted the idea to run a Boston time, and she successfully achieved this goal in 2010 at the Mangrove Marathon in Cape Coral, with a time of 3:45. She ran her first Boston in 2012 and describes feeling “awful and miserable”.

She attributes her struggles to the heat that year and the course's many hills, most famously Heartbreak Hill at mile 20, for which she was not prepared. “Heartbreak Hill broke my heart.”

Since then, Eveque has felt the need for a redo. “I need to go back and prove I can do hard things.” She qualified for Boston in 2022 running the Indianapolis Marathon with a time of 3:44:11. She has been training for the hills this time and feels prepared. Her goal for the race is to run a time to qualify for next year's Boston Marathon.

Naples' Jackie Wynn ran Boston in 2016 for a charity called “50 Legs” in support of the amputees from the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. She describes her first Boston as awful since she was nursing some injuries and not prepared for the hills. Since then, she has continued to run.

The 38-year-old finds time to train around being a mother of four and working as a family practice nurse practitioner. She describes running in the morning as a way to center herself and get the day started. She has gradually improved her method of training by incorporating strength training and speed work and managed to run a qualifying time at the 2022 Disney World Marathon with a time of 3:26, which she describes “as a runner’s cool achievement to qualify for Boston one time in their life.”After she qualified, Wynn became pregnant with her fourth child. Fortunately, the Boston Athletic Association, which runs the Boston Marathon, instituted a pregnancy deferral policy, and Wynn was able to defer to 2024. “I’m excited with a lot to look forward to,” Wynn said.

SWFL runners entered in Boston Marathon

This article originally appeared on Fort Myers News-Press: 2024 Boston Marathon: Naples, Fort Myers, Cape Coral runners ready to compete