Runners To Attempt ‘Double Boston’ Marathon Challenge

A tenacious seven-member team of athletes is training to run the Boston Marathon twice on Marathon Monday, April 20.

Individuals representing the Trail Animals Running Club will attempt the Double Boston. They'll run the Boston Marathon course in reverse from the finish line to the start, then rest briefly before tackling the standard Boston route later the same day.

Mount to Coast, a company that manufactures long-distance running sneakers for some of the world's most competitive races, is sponsoring the group.

According to a Boston 25 News report, Kathryn Zioto, Justin Hetherington, Jon Western, Maria Chevalier, Dave Desnoyers, Brendan Morgan, and Bill Dittman will start on Boylston Street in Boston and finish their first 26.2 miles in Hopkinton.

“People are like, ‘You're out of your mind,'” Hetherington said of the reaction he's received to his Double Boston plans. “My family and friends, they all just think I'm a maniac, but they know that by now.”

Hetherington is no stranger to marathons, having competed in three Boston Marathons in the past, plus a few ultramarathons. But the Double Boston is something entirely different.

“We're starting at three o'clock in the morning. So, that means I'm waking up at 1 a.m.,” he said. “It's cool, because there's that kind of to-be-determined uncertainty aspect of it. It's exciting and scary.”

To prepare for the Double Boston, Zioto has been doing one long run followed by one medium-distance run to train herself to run when her legs grow tired.

“Boston's a net-downhill course, which means that you're mostly running downhill along with one hard hill section,” Zioto said in an interview with Boston 25 News. “I think when you flip that on its head, that means that a lot of the course will be running uphill — the majority, actually.”