A 92-year-old runner marked the tip of an unbelievable 53-year streak on the Peachtree Highway Race on Tuesday, as the one particular person to have run in Atlanta’s famed Independence Day 10K yearly because it started in 1970 crossed the end line one final time.
Invoice Thorn, who served as grand marshal of this yr’s race, formally ended the streak Tuesday when he ceremonially broke the tape in a brief stroll to the end line as crowds cheered him on.
Though Thorn now makes use of a walker to get round, he took his ultimate steps towards the end line of Tuesday’s race unaided, elevating his fingers triumphantly as he broke the tape.
The previous highschool observe coach advised Atlanta’s 11Alive the choice to cease working the race was “laborious” however that he was “positively at peace” with placing the streak to mattress. “To be trustworthy, I’m sort of relieved,” he mentioned.
For Thorn, who was inducted into the Peachtree Highway Race Corridor of Fame in 1994, protecting the streak alive wasn’t all the time simple. One yr, he ran the race with a sprained ankle. He additionally as soon as completed the race throughout therapy for prostate most cancers. However along with his stability changing into extra of a problem in recent times, Thorn mentioned he agreed along with his household that it was time to rejoice his report streak by formally bringing it to an in depth.
Thorn was one in all 150 runners who ran the primary Peachtree Highway Race in 1970, and among the many group of solely 110 to complete that first race. He advised 11Alive that the thought of a streak by no means occurred to him earlier than it ballooned to the quarter-century mark. “I might simply present up yearly; nobody mentioned something (concerning the streak) till the twenty fifth yr,” he mentioned.
In 2019, to rejoice the fiftieth working of the race, Thorn crossed the end line with 4 generations of his household and Julia Emmons, former govt of the Atlanta Monitor Membership, which organizes the run. “It might’ve been only a fad,” Thorn mentioned of his streak that yr. “However as you go alongside by means of the years, individuals like Julia say to me each every now and then to ‘preserve going’ and that was actually encouraging, and so it simply turned a year-after-year factor.”
Right now actually marked a Peachtree to recollect.
It was a day like no different, with Invoice Thorn serving as Grand Marshal whereas ending his Peachtree streak, to the winners of all race divisions giving thrilling performances. Learn the complete recap at https://t.co/rYv8D91dBo pic.twitter.com/55TdOdbQQM
— AJC Peachtree Highway Race (@ajcprr) July 4, 2023
For the reason that pandemic, Thorn has accomplished the digital version of the Peachtree, working the gap round his neighbourhood.
Saying he nonetheless works out six days every week, Thorn advised the Atlanta Monitor Membership that “it’s been actually thrilling through the years, however there comes a time when it’s a must to let go,” including that “nobody else will be capable to say they did the primary 50.”
