There was the marathon in Nashville that Christine Mayfield dedicated to Brennan Stewart, a talented country music songwriter who never made it home.
There was the local run she did in honor of Nicol Kimura, who like Mayfield lived in Placentia. Then, there was the Valentine’s Day race she did in honor of a couple, Denise Cohen and Derrick Bo Taylor, also killed at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival in Las Vegas.
Mayfield, 58, will mark her 58th marathon race this Sunday — the Hoag OC Marathon — this time dedicating the feat to all the families and friends of the 58 people killed in the 2017 mass shooting.
Mayfield and her family were at the music concert that tragic day, her husband, Lennie, was shot in the arm by the armed assailant who ripped gunfire into the crowd. But unlike the 58 “angels,” as she calls them, she and her family survived.
Mayfield had already been an avid and accomplished runner. After her mother passed away 17 years ago, Mayfield took up the sport as a way to cope with the loss and pain.
She had just reached her 24th marathon when the shooting happened. She was at the concert with her husband, daughter Anne Marie, son Charlie and his now fiancée, Bekah Scheussler.
As the night got later, the crowds started to fill in, so Mayfield said she and her husband and daughter moved to the back, while the others stayed in the front — just where the gunman aimed his fire, she added. “They were right there where most of the fatalities occurred.”
One woman standing just next to Scheussler, Carrie Barnette, was killed. Chaos ensued, people running for their lives.
Mayfield said she and her daughter were separated from her husband, running for two miles before pounding on the door of a small hotel room.
“Some very kind people allowed us in their room, along with 12 other people. We all just stayed there on the floor,” she said. “We just kind of sheltered in place for about six hours, in the little hotel room.”
Her husband was treated in the first aid tent and taken to the hospital, later released with the non-life-threatening injury.
Mayfield said she knew, based on how it helped her mourn her mother’s passing, that running would be her therapy. But she found going out alone was hard, especially in the darkness of the early-morning hours when much of the marathon training happens.
So she found a running group, which turned out to be more than people to train with, but also a support group.
The fellow runners chatted along their routes, allowing her to open up about her trauma. They suggested honoring the 58 lost lives by dedicating the marathons to them, the fellow runners-turned-friends also running in their memory.
“It is a beautiful, therapeutic thing,” Mayfield said. “We all just carry their stories with us as a beautiful memory of these people who lived big, bold, full lives and we want their families to know their lives have impacted ours. It has been an absolute honor, for all of us.”
When Mayfield does a marathon for a particular person, sometimes more than one, she adds their names to her race bib and the group talks about what they know of that person to share their legacy.
“We saved No. 58 for families and friends. We’re really just going to hold them closely to our heart,” she said.
Mayfield and fellow runners from her group will be wearing T-shirts designed with the 58 names on the back. She hopes, for the families, it feels like a hug from someone they may not know, but who wants them to know their loved one is loved and appreciated.
“It’s been an absolute honor,” she said. “We will not forget them.”
The OC Marathon starts off at 5:30 Sunday morning from Fashion Island, traveling first toward Newport Coast and then along the shore to turn to run by the Back Bay and through parts of Costa Mesa and Santa Ana before ending at the OC Fair & Event Center.
This is the marathon’s 21st year, it is a qualifier for the Boston Marathon.