Surprise Motivation
Christine Chantegreil’s family made sure that she’ll never forget her first marathon
When his wife, Christine Chantegreil, decided to run her first marathon in Ottawa – not their hometown of Halifax – Frank Denis knew right away that he and the couple’s kids were going to be there to cheer her on. He memorized her splits, calculated where on the course it would make most sense to surprise her, and kept his plans a secret. Two days before the race, Denis, 43, Adrienne, 8, and Richard, 6, dropped Chantegreil off at the airport. The next morning, Denis told the kids to pack their bags. They were running after Mom.
“Crazy, crazy, crazy,” was Chantegreil’s view of marathon running when Denis ran his one and only in Montreal the year he turned 40. She was never tempted to run the distance until 2011 when she finished a half-marathon, her first real race, as part of the Scotiabank Blue Nose event in Halifax.
Chantegreil says she felt proud, yet envious as she watched the marathon runners continue. “I thought, ‘That was great, but I want to be those guys with the red bibs.’” It was just a question of deciding where and when. She chose Ottawa partly because it’s in May, which meant she could train through the late winter and early spring when Halifax’s roads and sidewalks are in decent condition. “And I heard it was f lat,” says Chantegreil, laughing. “That was important.”
The second half of the Blue Nose, in contrast, continues across the bridge in hilly Dartmouth.
The other significant reason for choosing the Ottawa Marathon was that it was happening on her birthday, May 27. Her brother, Philippe, four years younger and an Ottawa resident, shares the same birthday. He agreed to celebrate with her by running his first half-marathon.
Both Chantegreil and Denis got serious about running in their late 30s, after they were parents. “When I’m training it’s almost an escape,” says Chantegreil, who works full-time in the financial industry. They bike to work and seek out other time-efficient ways of staying in shape. During training, Chantegreil says she reached such a meditative state that she felt she could go on forever.
But she realized that race day was different and found her first marathon quite difficult. “I had a sign on my chest that said, ‘ Today is my birthday.’ So everyone was yelling, ‘Happy Birthday! Happy Birthday!’ I was high-fiving kids. And I think unfortunately, I did use up a lot of energy doing that.” And then, at the 19k mark, she spotted Denis and her own kids. “I started crying and then I couldn’t breathe,” recalls Chantegreil. The moment was captured by Tony Bailey, a professional photographer who happened to stand next to Denis. After hearing Denis’s story, Bailey offered to take the pictures. “It took a lot of pressure off,” says Denis.
Their reunion was short, with a real visit put off until the finish line. “I take off and I’m running and I’m thinking, how did he get down here? Did he drive here? Did he drive here on his own?” Chantegreil recalls, understandably cautious of long highway driving with her kids in the backseat. The anticipation of seeing them at the finish line – and finding out the whole story – motivated Chantegreil. Her mother, who’d come from Montreal, also got to see all four of her grandchildren at once. “There was definitely a net benefit,” says Chantegreil of Denis’s surprise. She finished the marathon in 4:28:15.