Southeast Man Who Ran in Marathon: 'Who Would've Thought?'

Southeast resident Terence McArdle had just reunited with his sons and brother—about 45 minutes after crossing the finish line at the Boston Marathon—when the first bomb exploded.

He was just a few blocks away.

"This is my tenth marathon overall, my fifth in Boston, and I really was just running this one to kind of hang up the marathon shoes," he said. "But I can't now."

At 41, qualifying for popular races, like Boston's, has become more difficult for McArdle. He started running at the age of 30 and wanted to prove to his sons, who attend Brewster Schools and are 9 and 12, that hard work will lead to big accomplishments.

"Now there are bigger causes," he said. "It's bigger than me."

McArdle, a banker who coaches kid's soccer locally, said he was lucky in a lot of ways. His 3-hour, 58-minutes timing was not the 3-hour, 4-minutes he once ran, but it put him away from the finish line when the chaos broke out. That means he was able to dodge some of the horrific scenes witnesses reported.

But he heard the "bedlam." And the thought of it, combined with the sheer exhaustion that accompanies the 26-mile trek, is "just nasty." 

"They're already shot," he said, noting the calf and groin injuries at mile 21. "You can't get up off a curb, you need help to get up."

Adding to the shock and sadness McArdle, described from his Nichols Road home Monday night was the fact that the marathon was dedicated to the 26 people who died in the . Thousands of people paused for a moment of silence before the race started.

One of many sending prayers and thoughts to those affected, McArdle is saddened to think that his fellow runners became witnesses to something awful. He remembered back to Sept. 11, 2001, and how "the world has changed."

"Who would've thought this would happen? It's a run."