By Madison Butkus
Hometown Weekly Reporter
Dover native Amy Ursitti, 24, is getting ready to run her second Boston Marathon on Monday, April 15th. Inspired by watching her mother run the marathon seven different times when she was a child, she immediately knew that if she were to run a marathon, she wanted Boston to be the first one.
Ursitti is running in support of the Mass General Emergency Response Team and is absolutely thrilled to be doing so. “I have been a patient at Mass General,” Ursitti stated, “since we moved to the Boston area when I was seven years old. And I have just always gotten the best quality care there and so has the rest of my family. So when I had the opportunity to run for MGH I had to take it just because of how great they are about providing care. Particularly the emergency department, that is the team I am running for.”
When the runner was in high school, she was on a training run for cross country when she was attacked by two pitbulls. She then had to go to the MGH Emergency Room to get rabies shots because they were the only place who had them nearby. She further explained, “Just how much the nurses and doctors who talked to me, who made me feel better and took care of me, there really is just incomparable care to that.”
Ursitti currently works for MGH as a Clinical Research Coordinator and has seen first hand just how much research is going on and how much MGH cares about their medical advances and overall care. With all of these reasons together, it has made her extremely excited to run for the team and fundraise for them.
In terms of training, Ursitti has endured 19 weeks so far but fully enjoys the challenge. “Training overall has been good,” Ursitti explained, “and I think something that has helped me a lot is I do a running group, The Heartbreakers in Boston. So just doing all of my long runs and speed workouts with friends has made things so much easier. It really is just a fun time to socialize and it doesn’t feel like I have to go for a painful twenty mile run. I think of it as a time to catch up with people and enjoy the opportunity to get outside in the winter. And now it is about getting some rest in before the big day.”
While Ursitti is running by herself this year, she does know an array of people who will be running within this marathon. Just as last year, she looks forward to celebrating her completion of the Boston Marathon with a good meal, maybe even that of a burger from Shake Shack.
To learn more about MGH and how to donate, please visit their website at www.giving.massgeneral.org. On behalf of Hometown Weekly Newspaper, we wish Amy and all running in the Boston Marathon good luck during Monday’s race!
