Ron Giles has done it -- 50 marathons in 50 states

Feb. 24—ROCHESTER — As the calendar turned to the year 2000 — "Y2K" as it was anxiously called — when the world seemed destined for computer meltdowns and other wackiness, Ron Giles and a pack of other Mayo Clinic workers decided to get in on it.

Their collective decision seemed particularly wacky for Giles, who'd never been a runner. But here they were, giving a group "yes" to running in the next Med City Marathon. They had each decided to do a half a one.

Giles was 30 at the time and was looking a bit "girthy" to be a marathon runner at 5-foot-8, 175 pounds.

But that was 20 years and 40 pounds ago. These days, at 5-8 and 135 pounds, Giles looks like he's run 50 full marathons.

Which he has, and then some, but more on that in a bit.

"I remember that first day of training together, we ran a mile and we were all gassed," Giles said. "But we determined we were really going to do this. Things got easier after that first month. I could see the progress."

Giles describes himself as intensely competitive. So, as things got "easier," the Rochester native and John Marshall graduate decided to take that original team goal of doing a half-marathon and raise it.

Giles was going to go for the whole enchilada. He'd be signing up for the full marathon, all 26.2 miles.

He finished it, all right, and things have never been the same for him since.

It set Giles on a mission of creating one marathon goal after the other for himself and ultimately had him on Maui, Hawaii, in January, celebrating having reached his ultimate mission, with friends Peter Somers and Dave Hillman of Rochester there to join him.

More on that in a bit.

"It took me about a year to realize I had a talent in marathon running," said Giles, also an active football, volleyball and softball referee. "The first time I ran the Med City, I ran it just to finish it. Then when I ran it again (in 2001), I dropped a half hour off my time. I decided then that if I work at this, I could be decent at it. That's when I got the (marathon) bug."

It's also when his goal setting started in earnest, something that's never let up. Giles' first wish was to qualify for the iconic Boston Marathon. He needed a time of 3 hours, 10 minutes to get there. He got that done at the 2001 Twin Cities Marathon, clocked in 3 hours, 3 minutes.

So, off to Boston he went in April of 2002, Giles having done race-specific training for the first time, his focus hill running. He'd done constant loops up Broadway Avenue, then up to Mayo Clinic Northeast and then down Viola Road to train for the uphills and downhills of the race. It wasn't enough for Giles that he'd qualified for Boston, he needed to hit another goal while there. He set out to finish in fewer than 3 hours.

Giles stopped the clock in 2:59.

From 2002 until 2011, Giles became a steady participant in the Med City Marathon. He became a name there, too, every year seeming closer to actually winning it.

In 2011, the king of marathon running in Rochester, Pete Gilman, did not participate in the Med City Marathon, opening the door for someone else.

Giles had made it his goal years before to eventually win the Rochester race, wanting to do it in front of his parents and so many friends and familiar faces.

In Gilman's absence, Giles finally got it done in 2011, clocked in 2:44.41, 5 minutes ahead of second-place Benjamin Kopecky.

He hasn't run the Med City since.

"Once I had that memory of winning it, I decided not to do it anymore, because I wasn't going to win it again," said Giles, whose times have gradually grown as he's aged.

With breaking the tape at Med City etched off his list, Giles next needed some other marathon goal to chase. He came up with it, all right, only this one was going to take years and years to reach.

Always fond of traveling and seeing all regions of the United States, Giles' quest became to run a marathon in all 50 states.

The 53-year-old Giles, who's run 75 marathons in his lifetime, already had eight states covered when he came up with the marathon-in-every-state idea.

"I'd say that I'm goal oriented and committed, and that I like to run outside," Giles said. "I'm not crazy. I'd say marathon running is a healthy habit, but people think I'm crazy for going that far."

Knocking out an average of two marathons per year, always in a new state and always spacing them so he had energy for each, Giles was at No. 49 after completing the Hatfield/McCoy Marathon in West Virginia in June.

It left him with just one left to get to 50, and he'd picked the most idyllic destination to polish things off — Hawaii. He brought those two close friends with him as he sought to get it done, Somers, who'd also participate in the race, and Hillman, who was not running, but there for the trip and to support Giles' mission.

"When we were there, we took a week's vacation," Giles said. "We did whale watching, did a pineapple tour and lots of other fun stuff. It was even better than I thought it would be."

Giles capped it off by running the Maui Oceanfront Marathon.

With it, he'd done it — 50 marathons in 50 states.

And his next goal? Well, for now, he's keeping it simple.

"It's just to continue to live a happy life," Giles said.

Yeah, he'll come up with something.