On February 28th, over 3500 runners from all over the world came to Moshi, Tanzania to participate in the Kilimanjaro Marathon (and Half Marathon and Fun Run). Although I didn’t witness it, apparently the crowd was thrilled when a Tanzania, Fabian Joseph, won the half marathon race with a record breaking time of 63 minutes and 59 seconds. As expected, the Kenyans cleaned up in the full marathon with Stephen Cheboguit winning in 2 hours, 15 minutes and 32 seconds, followed by two of his compatriots for second and third. In the ladies full marathon, the winning time was 2 hours, 40 mins and 22 seconds taken by Kenyan Fredah Lopeda. She was followed by another Kenyan and in third place a Tanzanian. In fact, it took a while before any non-East Africans passed the finish line, although there were many of us from around the world. Then there was me amidst other “social runners” finishing in 4 hours, 56 minutes and 16 seconds. Amazingly, I met a couple other people from the Seattle area during the run. It was a great first marathon.
Before the marathon with my girls from the Ruvuma region 
The last stretch
Happy to be done
They accidentally handed me a half marathon shirt. I made sure that was corrected real quick.
