Eighteen weeks ago, Charlie Adams wouldn’t have considered himself a long-distance runner; but on April 21, he will run the Boston Marathon.
Charles, or “Charlie,” Adams, a third-year industrial engineering major born and raised in Falmouth, Maine, always dreamed of running the Boston Marathon, the world’s oldest annual event of its kind. Although he’s always considered himself an athlete, playing soccer and hockey in high school and frequenting the gym in college, long-distance running was foreign to him. But Adams was up for the challenge.
“Growing up in New England and Maine, having family in Massachusetts as well, the Boston Marathon specifically is a milestone and a glorious sort of bucket list item for a lifetime. I wanted it in my college career,” Adams said.
But the road to the marathon is not an easy one. Before training can even begin, aspiring racers must qualify . For Adams, that meant he’d have to complete an entire 26.2 mile course in three hours, averaging 6.87 minutes a mile, and even then his acceptance was not guaranteed.
However, Adams found another path: sponsorship.
Runners can race in the marathon without a qualifying time if they are sponsored by an organization, and Adams’s organization of choice was the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. After applying and proposing a fundraising plan, Adams was accepted. As of April 16, Adams has raised nearly $9,500 to support the Claudia Adams Barr Program in Innovative Basic Cancer Research, a program that funds cancer treatment research. With a family member of his own currently being treated at Dana-Farber, running to support the institute made his marathon experience all the more meaningful.
“Being able to be sponsored by any organization is very rewarding … but particularly for our family, with our close ties, it’s been very special,” Adams said. “And the Dana-Farber community has also been very, very special to us as well, because they set up a lot of good amenities for all of their sponsored runners with weekly runs.”
Since January, Adams has been attending weekly runs in Wellesley every Saturday morning at 8 a.m. to prepare for the marathon. The training process was a grueling one, with Adams sometimes braving the elements just to get a run in.
“[The weather] is very, very tough, and I didn’t really think about it,” Adams said. “I was training in Maine when I went home a couple of times, and I was just running in snow, so you just try to not get hurt. But it’s an adjustment, for sure … it’s kind of the Boston way, given that it’s in April so if you’re living here, there’s no real other option, because the treadmill, in my opinion, is the enemy.”
Adams is not the only marathon runner in his family, as last year his sister, Northeastern alum Eleanor, or “Ellie,” Adams, ran under the sponsorship of Dana-Farber as well.
“We tracked her at mile six, mile 13 and at the finish line, and I was tearing up at the finish line, because, again, I didn’t have a long distance background, but I was training with her for, you know, probably significant couple months of her training, just doing some of the shorter runs with her. To just see her finish that feat that she dedicated four months of her time to is very special,” Charlie Adams said.
Charlie Adams is the youngest of three, and he and his siblings have developed quite the athletic resume. With his eldest sister, Madelyn Adams, known as Maddie, training for an IRONMAN triathlon and Ellie Adams preparing for the Chicago Marathon, the siblings always make time to show up and support one another. For Charlie Adams, that meant keeping his sister company during her tougher runs.
“[Charlie] was awesome. I think that he was one of my go to people. I would call him after my long runs and be like ‘Oh my gosh, I just ran 16 miles and that’s the longest of my whole life,’” Ellie Adams said. “… He would also run with me, which was really fun. On longer runs, I’d pick him up. I think he was living in one of the West Villages at the time, so I’d run down from the hill, pick him up and we’d do a little bit together and drop him back off and keep going.”
This semester, in addition to training for the Boston Marathon, Charlie Adams is on co-op at Risepoint and serving as vice president of TAMID, a pro bono consulting club at Northeastern. As a veteran marathon runner herself, Ellie Adams is aware of the physical and mental toll training for the race can take and is proud of how her brother has balanced his full plate.
“He’s always been a super driven person, and when he sets his mind to something, he does it,” Ellie Adams said. “But I think that now he’s not only training, but also very involved in many clubs. He’s on co-op right now, so I think that seeing him manage his time and be able to have such an impact on everything he is doing in his life and also crushing training for a marathon, which is very time consuming, … it’s honestly so impressive.”
For Charlie Adams, watching his progress over the past four months and completing his lifelong goal of running the Boston Marathon has been fulfilling.
“When my friends will say ‘Oh, I could barely run a mile,’ I’m like, listen, if you really needed to tomorrow, you could get through a marathon … It’s supposed to feel like it’s a hurdle that you can’t really do, because that’s the beauty in the training and seeing yourself progress to be able to do it,” Charlie Adams said. “But I think, truly, anybody could be able to do it any given day that they want to. It’s just a way to push yourself in a different way, whether that’s taking a harder class or maybe running a marathon. It’s just another way to push your boundaries.”
