Susan Jennings isn’t even tired.
At least the 49-year-old Clarke County resident said she wasn’t on Tuesday afternoon, after finishing her 15th marathon in 15 days.
And Tuesday’s run, her last, was the fastest run time she recorded: 26.9 miles from Amherst to Fort Hill United Methodist Church in less than four hours, 45 minutes, minus breaks for food and water.
“I have no blisters. It’s amazing. My legs aren’t sore,” she said, likening it to the account in the Bible’s book of Deuteronomy that tells how the clothes of the Israelites didn’t wear out, even after the people wandered through the desert.
The trip, she said, was an effort to raise $25,000 for the Bluemont-based group Teens Opposing Poverty, an effort to get youth involved in ministry to homeless and low-income people.
Her husband, Steve Jennings, serves as the group’s director. He said the ministry is expanding, spreading across Virginia, and the eight cities his wife ran through are all cities associated with the group.
From Winchester to Lynchburg, a trip of roughly 400 miles, Steve would track out a route by vehicle and Susan would follow, taking breaks to eat and get sprayed down with water.
“When I run, I feel God’s pleasure,” said Susan Jennings, who goes by “SuSu.”
That pleasure comes from the knowledge of why she’s running.
“A lot of times we think that we have to entertain youth,” she said. “But what youth really want is to know that they have worth and that they can contribute to society.”
Jennings shared some of her own story, beginning about three years ago when she weighed nearly 300 pounds and was tired out by walking around the block.
“I lost 135 pounds in a year and a half,” she said. “Along the way I discovered running.”
Since then, she said, she’s run ultramarathons, and even a 100-mile-race last year.
“I just think God has given me the gift of running,” she said. “Somehow, the way my body is made, it’s made for running long.”
Jennings likened her experience through running to her vision for youth ministry.
“I’ve been transformed. I believe that anything is possible,” she said.
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