Mile five. Your head hurts. Your feet hurt. You can’t find a steady way to breathe.
Mile nine. Stop now and all the pain would vanish. But you can’t. That little girl with cancer is waiting for you at the finish.
Mile 14. You are more than halfway there.
Mile 23. There is no way you can stop now. You are invincible.
Many Bexley teachers are runners. Some run marathons like the 26.2 mile Columbus Marathon, and some do it to stay fit.
Special education teacher Kara Hardesty has run one marathon.
“When I ran the marathon, it was the first time in my life that I ran consistently for the sake of running,” Hardesty said. “In high school, I played field hockey, which is a lot of running but not as much as a marathon.”
Hardesty said that she had a reason to run.
“I did it for a little girl with leukemia,” Hardesty said. “I knew that if I did it that way, there was no turning back—I would have to follow through.”
Despite the hard work, Hardesty kept running.
“The actual day of the marathon is all just a blur,” Hardesty said. “I threw up, and for a while all I could think about was stopping, but that little girl kept me going.”
Principal John Kellogg has run marathons, too.
“The Columbus Marathon used to have a relay division, and I ran it three times,” Kellogg said. “I ran it [three years] with Mr. Acton and [two years] with Mr. Valentine, and the third year Acton and I ran with someone else.”
Kellogg said even though he no longer runs competitively, he enjoys running for himself.
“It’s kind of a personal challenge to attain and hold onto something that I was pretty good at,” Kellogg said.
Assistant Principal Kristin Robbins started running four years ago and now runs on Saturday mornings with friends.
“In the summer, we run pretty regularly, but during the school year our schedules just don’t match, so we run on Saturday mornings,” Robbins said.
Two years ago, Robbins ran the Columbus Marathon.
“[Running the marathon] was on my life checklist of things I wanted to do before I was 40,” Robbins said.
Even though running is a lot of hard work, Robbins said that it is definitely worth it.
“Finishing was probably one of my top five experiences,” Robbins said. “It seemed like it went from something you could never imagine doing to being something that was attainable.”
English teacher Eileen McMahon agrees with Robbins.
“One really valuable lesson running provides is that it expands what ‘possible’ means to you,” McMahon said.
Science teacher Scott Logsdon enjoys running as a way to stay healthy.
“Running is a great way to have a nice, balanced lifestyle,” Logsdon said. “Everything seems to fall into place when I’m running. I feel better, I eat better, I am better.”
To Logsdon, running isn’t just something that you can do on a whim.
“I think people look at running like you can just do it, but it takes a lot of thought,” Logsdon said. “You have to be smart about pace and know the course. It’s a lot more than just putting on your shoes and going.”
Kellogg agrees with Logsdon that premeditation is a large part of running.
“The difference between being a competitive runner and just a runner is that you have to think about running, or else your body naturally relaxes,” Kellogg said. “Running has to be something that is really important to you.”
Published October 2007. Digitized 2025.
