Cassie Baillargeon, of Keene, crosses the finish line at the Boston Marathon on April 18. (Photo provided)

Keene resident Cassie Baillargeon completed her first Boston Marathon this past Monday.

She said it might be one of the most enjoyable marathons she had ever run.

“It was everything that I thought it would be,” Baillargeon said. “The crowds were incredible. It was a beautiful day. My knee didn’t hurt. My knee has been giving me issues for the last couple of years, so my training wasn’t really that optimal. I was going into it thinking I just want to run pain-free and not really go for time, but just go for the experience.”

Baillargeon, 40, finished the race in a time of 3 hours, 44 minutes, 22 seconds. Despite finishing the marathon in a sub-four-hour time, she said she did better than she thought she would, especially since she wasn’t able to use her global positioning system watch to track her pace.

“I don’t know what happened, my GPS watch would not sync,” Baillargeon said. “It wouldn’t update, and I wasn’t able to start logging my miles or anything like that, because it wouldn’t sync for whatever reason. By mile six, I was like ‘I guess it’s a sign that I’m running for feel.'”

Baillargeon said she went into the Boston Marathon with the goal of not worrying about her time, but rather the experience. While she normally wears a GPS watch in the races she competes in, she added that being without one made the experience a little more fun.

“I encourage other people to not run a marathon by time, but just by how they feel. That was the first time, I’d ever done that,” Baillargeon said. “When I ran in Chicago — that was the race that actually got me into Boston — I was constantly just looking at my pace. I guess it wasn’t as enjoyable. I was just constantly trying to get my time.”

Baillargeon got her first taste of running when she was in junior high at Saranac Central.

“I ran indoor and outdoor track and cross country, pretty much all the way through,” Baillargeon said. “I also ran in college. Running has always been near and dear to me, I’ve always loved it.”

Baillargeon wasn’t the only Saranac Central graduate to complete the marathon. Cadyville’s Brandon Darrah, who also graduated from the school, finished his third Boston Marathon with a personal record of 2:53:11.

“I was three seconds away from my overall PR. I had run my PR for the marathon in Erie Presque Isle in 2017 at 2:53.08,” Darrah said. “I beat my previous time for Boston by just about 10 minutes. I was running a phenomenal race the entire time.”

While Darrah, 33, said he was happy with his result, he was trying to get a time under 2:45 to qualify for the Berlin Marathon. He said he’s working on doing all six of the World Marathon Majors, which include Berlin, Boston, Chicago, London, New York City and Tokyo. He added that he has completed the Boston and Chicago marathons and will compete in the New York City Marathon later this year.

“For the first 17 miles, I was actually on pace to run a 2:44, but I fell off a little bit at mile 17,” Darrah said. “I’ve been dealing with an arm injury that kind of caught up to me. But I knew that I was still going to be on pace to my actual personal best, which was just a few seconds off of it. It’s a very hard course to run sub-three hours on, hitting that was just mesmerizing. It just goes to show, how well my coach did for me.”

Darrah said he started running when he was 11 years old and competed in indoor and outdoor track and cross country in high school.

“I went into the Army reserve and one of my drill sergeants convinced me to get back into running, and I reconnected with my now-current coach, and one of my best friends, Matt Medeiros,” Darrah said. “He got me into marathons and half marathons and it’s been successful ever since. It’s been about nine years of running half and full.”

Wilmington’s Andrew Lavin was exposed to marathons at an early age when his father started running marathons in the late ’70s and early ’80s.

“That was sort of the first running boom and New York City Marathon became a bigger thing. (My father) had a pretty big group of friends and they got into running pretty seriously and they all ran marathons. At a young age, I was going around to these marathons. That’s kind of what gave me the idea of doing it.”

While this year marked the third time Lavin, 43, competed in the Boston Marathon, his experience was different from his past two races. In the fall of 2021, Lavin competed in the Boston Marathon with limited entries and in 2020, he competed in the marathon which was held virtually.

“Getting back to a full crowd was a great experience,” Lavin said. “The weather was perfect and the crowds were great. The spectators were back out in full force. Overall just a wonderful trip.”

Lavin finished the marathon in 3:05:21. He said his results were a mixed bag.

“My training got interrupted a bit. I got COVID on a ski trip in February,” Lavin said. “That knocked me out pretty hard, I had two vaccines and everything and was still pretty encumbered for at least a whole month.

“Coming off a very cold January and being sick in February,” he added. “I wasn’t ultimately happy with my time, but I was happy considering the adversity leading up to it.”

After finishing the Boston Marathon, the next Lavin was out running again.

“I run every day, I have a pretty good streak going now,” Lavin said.

Since moving to Saranac Lake around seven years ago, Shannon Surdyk spends most of her time hiking, but last year she decided to get back into running.

Surduk said she earned a qualifying spot for the Boston Marathon after competing in the Lake Placid Marathon in September 2021.

“It was my first time ever running in a big city marathon, let alone the Boston Marathon,” Surdyk said. “I’m definitely not used to running with that many people, I mean you are literally in a mass of a hundred other people at all times.

“The crowds lined the streets in every town you pass through since it’s a point-to-point course,” she added. “A lot of really cool energy, it’s just a really cool experience overall.”

Surdyk finished the marathon in a time of 3:19:55, which was 35 seconds faster than her Lake Placid Marathon time. She said that she does a lot of trail runs in the Adirondacks which helped her with the terrain in Boston.

“Anytime I run a road race I consider it easier. The first half of the course there is a lot of downhill. Thankfully, since I run a lot of trails my quads are used to the downhill,” Surdyk said. “The second half of the course is when you get to the hills. Having enough energy to still be able to push on the uphill is important to Boston.”

While she said that the Boston Marathon was a cool experience, she added that she probably won’t go back next year, but could run it again in the future.

“I am looking forward to a lot of trail races this summer. Maybe another marathon in the fall,” Surdyk said. “I think I’m going to sort of switch gears a little bit and go from road races back to trail races.”

Lake Placid had three residents that completed the Boston Marathon. Gillian Ratay, 29, finished with a time of 3:18:41. Darci Whitney, 54, finished in 3:55:44, while her husband Bill Whitney, 60, finished after the six-hour cutoff time.