Keating fulfills goal of completing marathon
Jun. 26—Over the last decade, Sean Keating had gotten married and started a family, and he hadn't had as much time to focus on his physical fitness.
So in January, he started training for a marathon, taking on as big of a physical challenge as he could imagine. Then his dad's health started to decline, due to a horrible combination of dementia and Parkinson's disease.
So he got the idea to combine both challenges, raising money to bring awareness to research for dementia and Parkinson's to honor his dad John as well as completing the Grandma's Marathon, a physical task that would have made his dad proud.
"You train for something like this, and then they drop you off in Two Harbors and you think, 'I have to run all the way to Duluth,' " Keating said. "It's something I've wanted to do, and when my dad's health started getting worse, I thought I could use (the marathon) to raise money for Parkinson's awareness."
Keating, 39, a teacher and boys basketball coach at St. Peter, finished the 26.2-mile run in 5 hours, 4 minutes last weekend, running along the north shore of Lake Superior.
He's also raised $4,500 to donate for research into Parkinson's disease, a brain disorder that causes unintended or uncontrollable movements, such as shaking, stiffness and difficulty with balance and coordination. Symptoms usually begin gradually and get worse over time.
Keating said he was never much of a runner. In high school, he competed on the 4x800-meter relay in the one year he participated in track. He was more into basketball, playing a couple of years in college.
He ran a half-marathon last year in the Twin Cities, and that went well enough that his next goal was a full marathon.
"I needed to challenge myself," Keating said. "I had lost some of my attention to physical fitness so I need a reason to train and something to look forward to."
While training for the marathon, Keating mentioned on his Twitter account that his dad always told him that doing things you don't like to do builds character. He thought a lot about his dad to get through the struggles of a marathon.
"Anybody who has experienced dementia with a loved one, it's like experiencing two deaths," he said. "The first is when the mind goes, and the other is when the body breaks down. There was a lot of reflecting (during the run)."
As he finished the race, there were friends and family on site to celebrate. He met up with two friends from high school.
Keating ran alongside a pacer, exchanging stories about this man's 602 previous marathons.
"He kept me motivated," Keating said. "It was a super cool experience. It was the first year back with the full 9,000 runners; there were fighter jets. The runners were all ages, different shapes and sizes."
Keating was still recovering this week, proud of his accomplishment but no yet ready to commit to next year.
"As of today, I'd say yes," he said. "I can see how people get the bug to do this."
You can follow Chad Courrier on Twitter @ChadCourrier.
