| Kelly Keeler stands with her cousins John (left) and Mark Stoffel after she won the 1998 Garry Bjorklund in 1:15:16. The Stoffels completed Grandma's Marathon the same day.
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Running with Teri Dwyer
Kelly Keeler:
From running to running Grandma's Marathon
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Kelly Keeler runs to win the 2000 Human Race 8K in St. Paul, Minnesota. Keeler plans to run the Human Race again on March 19 as part of her comeback plan. Photo by Chris Fuller/The Sporting Life |
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I smoked on and off through college. Well, pretty much all the way through college. When I met my (now ex) husband,
he wasn't a smoker so I didn't smoke a whole lot when I was married. Or if I did, I sneaked it. When we split I started smoking again."I smoked for probably a year after I started running. I quit six weeks before I ran my first marathon. I quit in September, my marathon was in early November. It's not like I was smoking a pack a day then. The more I ran, the more I was able to cut down. But I was still smoking five or so cigarettes a day. It was so stupid.
"I lived by myself but I wouldn't smoke in my house because I was too embarrassed to have anyone know that I smoked. So I was standing in my garage and thinking, 'What am I doing?' I just went, 'This is nuts!' That was the pivotal moment. Since I was already hooked on running, it was actually pretty easy to quit because I really wanted to get better at running and I needed more lung capacity. It was pretty dumb."
That was Kelly Keeler's recollection of her life in 1994. Today, at 44, she's left the cigarettes behind for good and in doing so, opened herself up to life-changing possibilities. She's now a veteran of numerous road races, including the Olympic Marathon Trials, four Grandma's Marathons (1995, 1997, 1999, 2002) and four Garry Bjorklund Half Marathons (1998, 2000, 2001, 2003). She won Bjorklund in 1998, 2000 and 2001. She's also at the top of the "best
of" lists for a number of races and distances throughout Minnesota. A major injury kept her off the local running circuit from mid-2004 throughout 2005. But this year she's back on the path she started down more than a decade ago. Today running almost consumes her life, but that's just fine with Keeler. Last fall, she sold her home in Bloomington, Minnesota, and bought a new one in Duluth to take the
job of director of event and program development for Grandma's Marathon. I spoke to Keeler by telephone in mid-January, just eight days after the entry forms for the 30th anniversary Grandma's Marathon were mailed out. She was working when she answered her home phone at 8:30 p.m. "We've got the entries in for the marathon. We've already got about 6,000 so I'm just processing entries,"
Keeler said. "With the marathon it's first come, first served. So, as they come in, they get processed, until we hit 9,500. When we do, we'll finish up with that day's mail, and then it's closed." She continued, "It gets kind of crazy sometimes with the long hours but I've gotten so many great comments. As I'm processing these applications if I find there's something missing, I call the runner up and ask them
questions. People say, 'This is what makes Grandma's so great.' With most marathons, if you forget to write something down, it's 'sorry!'" Keeler was born in Minneapolis but her family moved a number of times when she was young. She graduated from high school in Omaha, Nebraska, and attended the University of Nebraska in Lincoln where she earned a degree in English. Her career in editing and publishing took her back to Omaha, to Dallas and
Austin, Texas, and then to Cincinnati. She eventually moved back to Minnesota in 1999. "My parents were born and raised in Minneapolis. They both went to Roosevelt High School," Keeler said. "I have an older brother and sister and a younger brother and sister. You can't get much more middle (child) than that."
Despite the athletic genes evident in her brothers and late father, Keeler did not participate in sports at all as
a child, in high school or college. She says she was "intensely shy" and sees that as her reason for not joining any teams.
She's come a long way since then.
"My first run was literally a race. Two weeks before my 32nd birthday (in 1993), I ran a 5K. Some friends at work talked me into going. I went and the rest is history," Keeler said. "I got hooked right away. I loved
it. I didn't love the running part so much. I was not in shape at all; I smoked cigarettes. I think it was just the social thing. And also I discovered that I was competitive. But when I did that race I still remember it so vividly. I was trying to pass people, even back then."
Her goal back then was simple: "Don't stop and walk. Run the whole way."
Her determination and consistency quickly paid off. After 10 months of running, Keeler won her first race.
"It was a point-to-point four-mile course in Cincinnati. I shocked myself; I didn't expect that. Then after that I got the fever."
After that, she said, "The floodgates opened. A year later I broke 17 (minutes) in the 5K. It really came fast."
Keeler ran her first marathon in Columbus, Ohio, in 1994, finishing in 3:18. "In 1995 I ran my first Grandma's in 2:55 and it just 'boom!' started happening."
That "boom" was her breakthrough onto the national running scene. She credits her return to Grandma's in 1997 as the race that first got her recognized as an elite athlete.
"My PR going in (to Grandma's 1997) was 2:54. I had run marathons before but I had never raced one," she said. "I went out and was thinking, 'I'm going to win this thing.' And I went for it. I led for 23 miles. I
ended up third. It would have been really sweet to have a total unknown take the race, but my inexperience took its toll. I ran a 2:42."
The years Keeler didn't run either Grandma's or the companion Bjorklund half, she volunteered at the races.
"I've done course tours the last two years at Grandma's and worked the information booth. I've also given speeches for 'Gearing Up for Grandma's' mostly training talks and motivational-type speeches," she said.
"Grandma's has always been my favorite race. I just always loved both the marathon and the half marathon and I've had my best times on this course. It's always been a special race for me."
Her running was what first earned her recognition at Grandma's. But her volunteer work was what solidified her relationship with the race organizers. In 2004, Keeler received one of Grandma's most prestigious
awards The Ron Daws Ambassador Award given each year "to an individual who has been a leader in the development and growth of long-distance running and who has a shared commitment to be an ambassador of Grandma's Marathon."
She said, "That was special, unexpected. I was really touched by that. But to me, the stuff I do it doesn't seem like work or that I'm putting myself out at all. I've enjoyed doing all the things that I've done for Grandma's."
This past fall, she upped her involvement again by taking her current position with the event. "The new job is just great," Keeler said. "I'm really enjoying it. I'd been wanting to get out of publishing for a very long time."
Keeler tried law school, but after a year she decided she didn't want to be 45 and $70,000 in debt when she finally graduated. So she went back to working in publishing.
"When this opportunity came up with Grandma's I just thought, 'This is perfect.' It's completely different than what I had done before but everything about it is just wonderful," she said.
Besides processing entries, Keeler is working on the races' ancillary merchandise line. "We've got training shirts and promotional shirts," Keeler said. "And we're expanding our online store. I'm going to manage the whole online store."
It's definitely an exciting time to be working for Grandma's. This June's race will be a milestone, its 30th year. "Marathon & Beyond magazine is doing a special edition and everyone who runs will get a copy of the book," Keeler said, adding, "There are going to be special logos and special merchandise available."
She said her transition to the new job, a new house and new city has worked out well. Now she hopes her
plans for a comeback in her running career will come together.
In February 2004, Keeler fell during a run and suffered a pretty traumatic impact injury. She hurt her knee and her arm.
"But I didn't stop running right then. I was training for the Olympic Marathon Trials. I ended up running but didn't finish the trials race," Keeler said. "I ran a little bit after the trials but my knee was bothering me more and more. I basically ran until I just couldn't anymore."
Over the next 16 months, she underwent two surgeries, endured months of physical therapy and cortisone shots.
"When I had my first knee surgery, at that time I was thinking, 'Oh, I'll be back, I'll be back.' And then a year goes by and I'm not even close to being back. When I realized that this could be it for me, I might not be able to come back," her voice trailed off
In late 2004, Keeler was finally feeling she could run again. She returned to racing in late January by running the Sporting Life's Frigid 5K at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds. She finished as the third woman overall and first female master's runner.
A few weeks later she ran the Winter Carnival Half Marathon in downtown St. Paul. She again placed third among the women and top of the masters.
Her first big test will be running the kick off race for the USATF-MN Team racing circuit The Human Race along Summit Avenue in St. Paul on March 19.
After her two early-season races, she said, "Now I'm feeling like, 'Well, maybe I can, maybe I can.'"
Her next big hope is that she hasn't left her marathon career behind her. "I will run another marathon. I can't end my marathon career with a DNF. I just can't. Even if I drag my carcass down the road, I will run
another marathon."
Better yet, she said, "I would really love to be able to qualify for another Olympic Trials."
When asked about the many awards and honors she's accumulated in her relatively short running career qualifying for prestigious races, making U.S. teams, winning races, setting records none of those things are what are most important to Keeler.
"The thing that's been most significant for me, the greatest thing in running, has just been being embraced by the whole running community," she said. "What's meant the most to me is how many friends I've made, how many great people I meet. And it's why I've struggled so hard these last couple of years to get back. I don't want to let it go."
She concluded, "If you had asked me a week before I ran that first race (in 1993) if I'd be doing this, I
would have thought you were nuts. It was like I found 'my thing' by accident. It could have passed me by so easily. I feel really lucky. It's changed my life so completely."
Teri Dwyer, based in St. Paul, Minnesota, has been a runner for over 20 years and a writer for longer than she can remember. |
