MISSOULA — Sunday capped three days of races with the Missoula Marathon.
The only thing better than running the Missoula Marathon is finishing it, and that’s why the runners headed down to Caras Park on Sunday to recover from their big races.
Another successful Missoula Marathon is in the books and thousands of runners were backed by the Missoula community in their respective races.
Shelby Smith, who just ran her first half marathon, says the encouragement from her friends and the crowd helped her finish the race.
“It was awesome, and it was so motivating to have people along the sides cheering you on or kids squirting you with a water gun it was just a good time and [it] kept me going.”
While many of the runners are thinking about how they will recover from this race there are some who are already looking ahead to their next race.
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Dennis Askew is attempting to run 50 marathons in as many states and Missoula was his latest stop on that journey.
“Gotta catch ‘em all, I love Pokémon, and this is my version of Pokémon, so I’m catching all these medals, a little bit more grueling but I’m at 35 so only 15 more states to go.”
Askew, who has run in 35 half-marathons, says there was one thing that was unique to the Missoula Marathon.
“I think for this run, it’s one of the most friendly runs I've done and people that are from Missoula were very friendly, very warm — which I just didn’t expect.”
Watch KPAX's special coverage from the finish line of the Missoula Marathon below.
This year nearly 6,000 runners registered for the weekend’s events. About 3,000 signed up for the half marathon and just under 1,500 registered for the full Missoula Marathon.
Additionally, organizers say more than 1,400 people took part in Saturday’s Tony Banovich 5K race, and 291 children ran in the kids run on Saturday.
