Dear Mr. Terrorist,
Four days ago our beloved Boston Marathon competition, the world's oldest and most prestigious Marathon race, was tarnished by your horrendous act of cowardice.
Make no mistake Mr. Terrorist, this letter serves by no means the purpose of giving the slightest bit of consideration for your motive, your ideology, your message or the so-called values you may stand for. Rather, this letter is one of gratitude. Through your actions, you have succeeded in showcasing the best of our community while demonstrating the genuine and perennial disinterest we, athletes of all horizons, have for your cause. We thank you for that.
As you were plotting this vicious act of nonsense, did you have any idea of who you were dealing with? Marathoners, ultra marathoners, duathletes, triathletes, endurance machines, the most resilient and strong-willed group of people on the planet! Every day we go to war, E-V-E-R-Y single day. We rise before dawn rain or shine, we train with rigor and dedication, and we challenge ourselves with no incentive whether it be financial or fame, and in complete anonymity for days, months, years, decades. We train, we better ourselves and we race for our families, our friends, our peers, ourselves, the worthy causes we believe in and we take on the challenge of running 42.195 kilometers as fast as we possibly can to give substance to this philanthropic dedication that defines each and every one of us. Did you honestly think for one split second that your actions would grant you a voice amongst us and that anyone would bother listening to you in the aftermath? We have too much to share, too much to give and way too many accomplishments to fulfill for that. Your voice will remain unheard and your cause will be crushed like the million of personal athletic records so many athletes crush every day through their hard work and self-discipline. We thank you for that.
Mr. Terrorist, the strength of our community and our unison is as unwavering as your attempt was failed. We only emerge stronger from your actions and the symbolisms of such strength are too many: Bill Iffrig who was thrown to the ground 15 feet away from the finish line when the shockwave of the first blast caught up to him, got up, and decided to finish the race. He is 78 years old…Cancer survivor and 3-time super bowl champion Joe Andruzzi sprung into action to carry an injured woman to safety despite the pending threat of more possible explosions. John Mixon, a 60-year old builder and his friend Carlos Arredondo jumped into action to tear down a fence, carry bleeding victims and apply pressure to the hemorrhaging limbless injured. You see, it is these heroic stories of people who combine risk and generosity that define us. It is with them and for them that we will keep running, that we will keep racing, in greater numbers than ever before, in Boston despite your senseless act, in New York despite hurricane Sandy, and in more places than ever before. We thank you for that.
You took away the lives of three of ours. Martin Richard, only 8 years old, who embraced all the positive spirit of our community as he waited for his father to cheer him on at the finish line, Krystle Campbell, and Lingzi Lu who, through her Chinese nationality, incarnated the truly international spirit of our world of athletes, as did the nations' flags that lined the finish line, these flags that stood up straight and high despite being a few feet away from the epicenter of the explosion. We will mourn Michael, Krystle and Lingzi, we will mourn them with all the might, the stamina and the dedication we put in every single one of our training sessions, every single one of our races. We will also cherish and cater to all those you injured and ensure their spirit and strength grows stronger than they could have ever imagined themselves: many will recover, run and race again. Others will race for the very first time and today's moments of sadness will quickly make way for beautiful moments of hope, of joy, and of inspiration as both the reborn and new born athletes challenge the roads. We thank you for that.
For too long have we seen ongoing footage of the devastation you left in Boston Monday. While you may think these images will haunt us, it is rather images like the ones in this post that we hold dear to our hearts, images of '7-year old and under' children competing fiercely, with as much might as innocent care and love that they have for one another. These are pictures I took at the South Beach Nautica triathlon last week, 8 days before the Boston Marathon. While there are and there will be more such pictures crowding our minds, there will be neither empathy nor attention given to people of your kind. We thank you for that.
With great disdain,
Antoine Trépant (www.tonio-triathlon.com)
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