By Tyler Buckentine, St. Cloud Times, Minn. –
April 21–Gerad Mead called himself “lazy” when he referred to his days as a high schooler in northeast Iowa.
He said he put on 20-30 pounds as a freshman at the University of Northern Iowa and that prompted him to start his long-distance running career.
“I picked up running in college to lose weight, basically,” said Mead, a 32-year old native of Charles City, Iowa. “Now, I run a race pretty much every weekend.”
Mead, who lives in St. Paul, won Friday night’s Earth Day 5K. He crossed the finish line on the turf at Husky Stadium with a time of 16:37. A record 1,621 runners participated in the 5K.
Mead will race in today’s Earth Day Half Marathon.
He beat Nate Leckband of Eagan, who finished in 17:39. Elijah Lee of St. Michael took third in 18:40.
