Stonebrooke foursome completes Grandma's Marathon

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As a seasoned and respected civil engineer who has worked on hundreds of roadways across Minnesota, Tim Arvidson is well aware of just how long a mile is.

But as one of four members of Stonebrooke Engineering’s professional staff to run the 26.2-mile Grandma’s Marathon last month, Tim was introduced to just how long 0.2 miles can be.

“I came around the last corner of the race and saw the finish line still a thousand feet away and I said, ‘Are you bleepin’ kidding me?!’” laughed Tim, a first-time marathoner. “I swear that last mile of the race seemed to go on forever.”

A team effort
Tim was joined by first-time marathoners Brenda Arvidson, Kelly Besser and Chad Seaman. “Team Stonebrooke” began training in February and regularly updated their training progress on a board in the firm’s office. The group convened on Sundays to do their longest training runs together.

“It was a lot of fun doing this together,” said Kelly, who missed three weeks of training due to a stress-fracture in her leg. “It was a good team-building exercise for all of us — something we actually looked forward to.”

The rigorous training paid off as the foursome overcame every obstacle that the 32-year-old race threw at them, including the course’s dreaded Lemon Drop Hill at mile 22 and a heat index of 91ºF.

The team members finished the race with times ranging from 4:11 to 4:50.

“The heat was a really big factor in our finishing times,” Brenda said. “We had higher expectations for how long it would take us to run the race but, as it was, we were just happy to finish.”

Again in 2010
Despite their struggles, all four — along with new Team Stonebrooke recruit Shawn Bloch — plan to run the race in 2010.

And why not? The Stonebrooke team did learn some valuable lessons that may inspire and inform their work on future roadway projects.

“I learned that flat roads are nice,” Chad quipped. “I think flattening out Lemon Drop Hill would make for a nice future project for us.”

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