Local mother to run in Boston marathon

Kim Cowart didn't grow up dreaming of athletic achievement.

Sports were what other people did, and though she sometimes enjoyed watching, they were not part of her daily life.

"Never," she said of participating in sports as a youngster. "Not a day in my life. I have zero coordination, so I just figured athletics were out of the question. I just never tried it."

That is until the self-described bookworm thought she needed to shed a few pounds.

"I don't really know," she said of what prompted her to take up running while she was attending Southern Utah University. "I think I was just looking for a way to stay active. You can run anywhere."

Cowart's desire to keep her weight in check took her on an unexpected journey that will lead to the starting line of the Boston Marathon on Monday. The race that every serious runner dreams about qualifying for will be Cowart's fifth 26.2 mile race.

"It will be two years ago to the day that I qualified for the Boston Marathon," said Cowart. "It wasn't a goal. I had never run a race in my whole life, ever."

It was her husband, Christian Cowart, who looked up the qualifying times and planted the seed in the mind of his very competitive, very determined wife.

"I think he knew that if he said that, I would have it in the back of my mind," the 34-year-old graduate of West Jordan said. "And while I would say to everybody that I just wanted to finish, if I'm honest, I really did want to qualify. And I did — with 55 seconds to spare."

Her qualifying time: 3:40:05 in the 2008 Salt Lake Marathon.

"It wasn't a great race," she said laughing. "There was a bad head wind for 14 miles. I'd gone out too fast; I had side stitches; I wasn't prepared. I didn't know what I was doing."

And while the fact that she has athletic talent may surprise some, those who know her best said they see her applying the same commitment and determination to sports that she's always applied to the rest of her life.

"I guess we were surprised in a way at her ability," said her mom, Debbie Hammond. "But she has the same drive and focus in everything she does."

Her husband was inspired to take up running because of his wife and her success.