Minneapolis Man Prepares For Boston Marathon After Missing 2013 Tragedy
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The Boston Marathon is on Monday -- two years after the bombing that killed three people and wounded more than 250 -- and two weeks after the lone surviving bomber, Dzokhar Tsarnaev, was found guilty on all charges.
It's a big day for a Minnesota man with a meaningful connection to the race.
Matt Grey will be running in it for the first time.
"Boston is the goal race for most people for their bucket list for their entire lives," he said. "So running that is going to be really fun."
Grey was originally supposed to run his first Boston two years ago, but after signing up, he had to drop out after deciding to move to Minneapolis right before the race.
"Logistically and cost-effective wise, I couldn't afford to go to Boston two weeks after I moved out here," he said.
Instead, he watched from home as the horror of that day unfolded.
"I was in the kitchen cleaning up and I heard it on the TV," he said, "and I turned around, and I was like, 'what the heck just happened?' I think it was probably not until like two days later that you finally had every friend accounted for."
Grey would've already finished his race by the time the bombs exploded, but said he "definitely" would have been waiting for friends at the finish line at the time of the bombing.
"So I could've been near it," he said. "It's a scary thought to think of where you could've been on that day. You never know."
As he gets ready to run it this time, he says he hasn't thought much about Tsarnaev's guilty verdict earlier this month.
"It's something where I don't want to give him any more attention than he needs," Grey said.
What he will be thinking about, especially as he nears the finish line, are all the people impacted.
"I don't know how I'll feel till I get there," he said. "It's something that you won't know or you can't probably describe until you're there, the feeling of all the people in the crowd.
"Going through that spot is going to be exhilarating, and sad. And (I'm) probably going to feel a mix of like every single emotion [as I'm] going through."
The Marathon Sports store on Boylston Street in Boston was badly damaged in the bombing. The two stores are not affiliated, but Matt says his store in Minneapolis was flooded with phone calls from people offering support.