William Campbell High School principal finishes Boston Marathon in under 3 hours

By Ted Allen
Lynchburg News & Advance
Published: April 22, 2008

William Campbell High principal Rob Arnold, 36, clocked the fastest time among area participants in Monday’s 112th running of the Boston Marathon.

Arnold qualified at the Shamrock Marathon in Virginia Beach last March, with a time of 3 hours, 7 minutes on an extremely flat, 26.2-mile course. On Monday, after training “non-stop, every day” for the past year, he finished 1,154th overall in 2:59:27.

“I met my personal goal (so) I feel really good right now,” Arnold said by cell phone as he strolled the streets of Boston with his family Monday afternoon. “It was pretty difficult (but) it was a great day to run. It was fantastic. You couldn’t ask for a better day.”

His time placed him in the top five percent of the 25,283 Boston Marathon finishers, on a much hillier course than the Shamrock. The point-to-point from Hopkinton to downtown Boston started with a 16-mile slight downhill before climbing for the next six miles and going back down and leveling off for the final four.

“The course is interesting,” Arnold said. “It does some strange things to your legs when you’re going downhill for 16 miles and then you start to climb. It’s not straight downhill, it’s just a decline and it wears your quads out. After you go downhill that long, you really want to not go downhill anymore. The last mile or so, I was feeling it (but) it went really well. I felt real good. I’m all right.”

The downhill start caused many first-time Boston Marathoners to go out too fast.

“With all the excitement to start, going down hill, you’re going faster than you want,” Arnold said. “You couldn’t keep up that pace and there were people dying all over the place (when they got to the uphill stretch). I tried to stay within myself and pace myself.”

He was overwhelmed by the size of the race and even more by the number of spectators, with the race held on Patriot’s Day, a state holiday.

“The runners were eight deep for the last three miles (and) there’s not a point on that course where nobody is standing and cheering,” Arnold said, noting Lance Armstrong was in the crowd and the Boston Red Sox, Celtics and Bruins were all in action at home throughout the day. “The Red Sox’s game started at 10 a.m. to try to time the ending for when a lot of the runners go by (Fenway Park). It’s quite an electric sports atmosphere.”

Other area runners included Bret Boman, 49, of Forest, who finished in 3:26:21 and Nancy O’Brien, 40, and Ellen Sarantos, 44, of Lynchburg, who ran together the length of the race, completing the course in 3:57.22.