The name is quick and has a metronomic quality – Shiloh Schulte – just like his gait.
Schulte, a Kennebunk resident and member of the town’s board of selectmen, was the fastest Maine finisher at last week’s 123rd Boston Marathon.
Ayuh.
During Schulte’s fifth Boston Marathon, the 40-year-old made the Hopkinton-to-Boston journey in a tidy 2 hours, 36 minutes, 8 seconds.
He placed 20th in his age group and 238th overall.

Schulte, who is American Oystercatcher Recovery Campaign Coordinator at Manomet, was asked what, if any, parallels there are between being a selectman and endurance running.
“That seems like a loaded question,” Schulte said with a laugh. “I guess just that both require a lot of time commitment and focus on a positive outcome. Also, that neither would be possible without significant support from my family.”
Robert Ashby, 50, of Brunswick, placed third in his age group and 294th overall in 2:38:23. Just a couple minutes behind Schulte. Ashby and Schulte are teammates in the Dirigo Running Club that features many of the top runners in the state.
“He’s been coming on,” said Ashby of Schulte’s ascension within the Maine running scene. “It’s been pretty amazing. He hasn’t been running (races) for that long. I’ve been told by friends and teammates who look at Strava (running app) that he’s been logging some heavy miles at fast paces, really ripping it up.”

Schulte started running in 2011 after his wife encouraged him to join her and train for a local 5K.
In 2013, Schulte witnessed the Boston Marathon bombing and decided that he wanted to run 26.2 miles.
“I didn’t really think I could or have any ambition to run a marathon before that,” he said. “I said ‘OK, I’ll do Boston next year’ and then found out I had to qualify to run Boston so I signed up for another marathon.”
Schulte fell ill and was not able to make it to that qualifying marathon.
In fall 2013, he entered a marathon in Plymouth, Massachusetts, in November and qualified, but had missed the September deadline date for the Boston Marathon and was unable to run in 2014.
Schulte ran his first Boston Marathon in 2015 and has been in the field each year since then.
“It’s quite different from any other run or race that I’ve ever done,” said Schulte. “It’s the only really large marathon that I’ve been involved in.”
He described the 26.2-mile race as “epic, supportive, wild and unlike anything he’s been a part of before.”
“You’re running in a field of people shoulder to shoulder, especially at the start, all around you as far as you can see ahead of you – as far as you can see behind you,” said Schulte. “There’s just this river of runners coming down the road and just to be in the middle of that and to be part of that, it’s a wild experience. As you get closer into the city the crowds just get deeper and thicker and then by the time you’re down to the last mile, it’s just like a wave of sound surrounding you as you come in. It’s hard to describe, but it’s not like anything else I’ve been a part of.”
Schulte also described the consistent support as unreal during the race.
“When you’re actually running the race, really end-to-end, the support is amazing,” he said. “It’s pretty unreal. You have these little towns out in the west of Boston that look like any other sleepy little town, but it looks like everyone in the town has come out and is lining the streets screaming and yelling and really for 26.2 miles there’s people cheering you along the way.”

Schulte’s goal throughout training for the Boston Marathon was to have his “personal best in every race distance that he could manage.”
He ran a 2.5K, 5K, 10K, 10-miler and half marathon before competing at Boston and achieved his personal best at every race. The Boston Marathon would be no different as he was able to again produce a personal best.
“I have been working pretty hard, the last few years especially, trying to improve the quality of my running to be more focused and strategic about it,” said Schulte. “Going into Boston, I had a pretty ambitious plan for what I wanted to accomplish and I managed to pull it off on a day that wasn’t the easiest from a weather standpoint. I feel really happy. I’m very proud of the accomplishment and really grateful to the amount of support that I’ve had along the way to make it happen.”

As Schulte, Ashby and thousands of other runners made their way to the starting line in Hopkinton, they prepared for the worst as thunderstorms and rain swept in.
By the starting gun, however, the weather had made a hairpin turn.
“The conditions weren’t that bad when the race started, but when we first went out to Hopkinton (for the start), it was raining cats and dogs and we had to keep our shoes in plastic bags to keep them dry,” said Ashby, who has been on the Dirigo team since its inception in 2002. “But once we got into the middle of the race, it was actually good running weather. The sun broke out a few times and it actually started feeling a little muggy.”
Schulte successfully adapted to the changing conditions on his way to becoming the standard bearer for Maine.
“He definitely appears to have more PRs coming,” Ashby said. “If you look at the race and time conversions, he’s got the potential to go faster.”

Dan King can be reached at editor@kennebunkpost.com. Sienna Barstow can be reached at sbarstow@journaltribune.com.

Copy the Story Link

Comments are not available on this story.