This guy is my new idol

Rocker rolls in half marathon

By MONTY MOSHER Sports Reporter

Sunday was a beautiful day for Toronto’s Shawn Brady.

The 31-year-old singer, part of the U2 tribute band Elevation playing in Halifax this weekend, crawled out of bed after a late Saturday gig to win the Blue Nose half marathon in a cakewalk.
Brady covered his 21.1 kilometres in one hour, 13 minutes and 33 seconds, more than three minutes ahead of William Fitzgerald of Carbonear, N.L., who crossed in 1:17.10.

The singer/guitar player, a physiotherapist by day, ran the race in a Motorhead shirt with ripped shorts.

He’s no novice on the roads. He ran the Chicago Marathon in 2002 and clocked a 2:27 in Honolulu last December.

He aspires to crack 2:25 before the end of this season, perhaps back in Chicago or in Toronto.
"This was a great opportunity to pursue two passions in one weekend: my music and my running the next morning," said Brady, who had his band mates cheering him on at the finish line.

"It was a challenging course with lots of hills. I pulled away about the 10-K mark and I just kept pushing the pace until about the middle of the race and then around 15-16 K, I figured I had it won so I stuck with it until the end."

His band played at the Pogue Fado in downtown Halifax until 2 a.m. and "and then had a couple beers after the show."

He got up after a few hours of sleep and looked like a guy desperately in need of a nap after the race. The band had a charity show in support of Multiple Sclerosis later Sunday before being scheduled to leave this morning.

"I just wanted to get a good run in and see if I can actually win it, depending on the competition," he said. "My personal best is 1:08.41 for the half marathon and I was quite a bit off that today. I admire anyone who actually set personal bests in the conditions and on this course, which was quite difficult. I just came out to get a hard solid run in. It was a good way to get me out of bed."

Kevin Strom, one of Brady’s band mates, admires Brady’s commitment.

"It’s amazing someone can run that long," Strom said. "If I ran 20 minutes I’d be dead."

A former cross-country and track athlete at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., Brady took four years off between marathons, mostly just trying to make a living.
"I was busy with work and busy with the band," he said. "Keeping in competitive running takes a lot of time and energy. I’m trying to get back into top level."

Bridgewater’s Terry Melloy, who won the Blue Nose half marathon last year, placed third in 1:17.56.
Cliff Worden-Rogers of New Germany (1:20.05) and Peter Sullivan of Halifax (1:20.32) completed the top five.
The race attracted 1,496 runners, 656 of them men.

http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/News/836691.html