Over the weekend I covered the Austin Marathon for the Statesman.
I got up at 5 a.m. and drove to Austin for the start of the race. I couldn’t believe how many people were there – and before sunrise! Over 20,000 runners gathered at the capital to run a marathon, half marathon or 5K.
I shot the start as the sun was rising and 30 minutes later, people were still crossing the starting line. I was heading to my next shooting spot when a small group of runners passed. One of them was chanting “Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming…” from the movie Finding Nemo. I thought it appropriate for the race and even more appropriate for my weekend since I finished shooting 2 days of state swimming finals the night before and I was looking forward to 4 hours of meetings after the marathon was over.
No matter how challenging my weekend, it was nothing compared to running 26 miles. Congrats to the winners, finishers and even those who trained, attempted, but couldn’t finish. A marathon is no small task.
Here are some photos:
For more photos click here: http://galleries.austin360.com/gallery/austin-marathon-022011/