Determination of a marathon man

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/04/2022 (1436 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Twenty years ago I developed heel spurs and gave up running. I bought a pair of roller blades, which were easier on my heels, and started skating in Birds Hill Park. I would start at the stables and skate around the north and south drives and finish with a circuit around the lake, giving me a total of 20 kilometres. Often I would see a diminutive woman on the other side of the road logging the miles. As we were on opposite sides of the road going in opposite directions we never got a chance to talk but saluted each other with a comradely wave.

A few years ago I started to see her using the track at the Peguis Trail Health & Fitness Centre at Chief Peguis School, and we had an opportunity to introduce ourselves. Her name is Ada Letinsky and she’s a marathon runner, having run 68 marathons, including several times in Boston, Chicago, and New York. She was first woman in her age class in the Manitoba Marathon three times, and has a personal best of 3:05.

Ada spent a good deal of time training and racing with Greg Brodsky, the renowned Winnipeg defence lawyer who died on Feb. 9. She said that everyone knew Greg was a world-class defence lawyer, but few knew he was also a serious marathon runner and happy to be known as one.

In 1993, the night before he was set to run in the New York City Marathon, he called a doctor to his hotel room and asked for a cortisone shot in his right knee. The doctor refused, knowing that Greg should not be running on it. Greg ran anyhow. At mile 17, when one of his sons joined him, Greg asked, “Are my legs still moving?”

After finishing her run, Ada waited two hours for Greg to come in. She watched as he limped across the finish line and collapsed into a waiting wheelchair.

For one of his birthdays, she gave him a blow up of a picture of him in the wheelchair after the New York marathon. She titled it Determination.

“He was a great story teller,” she said. “I knew he would enjoy explaining the title to those who saw the picture.

“Greg told me later that someone stole the picture from his office. Someone, somewhere is looking at that shot and missing Greg, as so many of us are.”