Dear God...

.... please be with the marathoners today.

Thanks for the summer weather, but I know the type of runner who runs Boston.  He will be a serious runner.   He has earned his trip and his chance to PR a very difficult race and, while he is not dumb and will be Type A and have planned every mile-split and water stop and gel-inhalation, he will have pride and will want to say he ran a very difficult race on a very difficult day very well, even if much of that race unfolds on shadeless concrete boulevards -- both the downhill in Framingham and the uphill over Rt 128 in Newton (why, God, why?) -- full of other sweaty, heaving, gasping strivers.

Please do your best to convince him, should his pride trump his physical and mental capabilities, that it ain't worth heat stroke.  Even if he prays to you otherwise.

Thanks, by the way, for not trying to convince me that, last fall when registration rolled around, I should run it too. Running a mile in 85 degrees is a challenge.  Running any more than that is a special form of hell. You've seen to that.

Amen.