Lakewood Ranch resident shows resolve in 50-state marathon quest

It takes a special kind of person to run a marathon, and Lakewood Ranch resident Regina Morris has taken that to another level.

When the 63-year-old Morris crossed the finish line at the Bay of Fundy International Marathon in Lubec, Maine June 22, she had officially completed a marathon in each of the 50 states.

At the peak of my running phase, I would run a 5K four to five times a week. By the end of those 3.1 miles, I was ready to call it a day.

For Morris, that’s a warm-up, which is just one facet of her inspiring mentality.

To understand why Morris would set out on such an arduous journey, one first has to understand her background.

Morris was raised in Sarasota by her mother, Lillie Morris, who worked long hours and was a no-nonsense disciplinarian. 

She might have found her passion for running in cross country or track at Sarasota High School, but she couldn’t stay for practices because she had no transportation home.

After graduating from high school, Morris enlisted in the Marine Corps as a way to pay for college, but wound up staying for 20 years as a court stenographer.

Though Morris had to run when she was in the Marines, she disliked it because she struggled to keep up with her male counterparts, who had far longer strides than her 5-foot-2 frame could produce.

Once she retired from the Marines in 1999, Morris was living in California and needed a new challenge. A newspaper ad for a local marathon in San Diego piqued her interest, and she felt she had to commit to it when her husband, John Annis, questioned if she would follow through.

Morris ran that marathon and then ran the Marine Corps Marathon in 2000. Then she took off six years before running another marathon. Once she started again, she was hooked. 

After she ran her 12th marathon, Morris set a goal of running one in each state, something she wasn’t sure she could complete.

Bumps and bruises

Running is a non-contact sport, but that doesn’t mean that runners are immune to injury. 

Once while running a marathon in Oregon, Morris felt a pain in her foot with two miles left in the event. She tried to walk instead, but that didn’t ease the pain, so she ran the final two miles on what she later discovered was a broken bone in her foot. 

“I didn't want to regret it, because what if I had stopped?" Morris said. "I’ve never not finished.”

Image courtesy of John Annis

In 2020, Morris was running in Lakewood Ranch to stay in shape after COVID-19 had paused her marathon quest. While daydreaming and looking up at the stars in a fatigued state, she tripped over raised concrete in the sidewalk and broke her ring finger, catching herself on the fall. 

Morris simply straightened out her finger and kept on running, though the bleeding became too severe and she eventually had to cut her run short. She shrugged off questions about her pain tolerance, but her husband was quick to say how remarkable she can be in the face of discomfort. 

“If I get a little headache, I have to go to a room in the back (of the house), and I don’t want anyone to talk to me,” Annis said. “She would get migraines way back when, and I’d come out to the kitchen and she’d be cooking, and I’m like, ‘What are you doing?’ And she’d be like, ‘Well, it has to get done.’”

The most challenging marathon Morris has run came in Huntsville, Utah in September 2018.

After spending much of her time running in the heat and humidity of Florida, Morris didn’t give much thought to how much elevation would affect her breathing. But her run in Utah covered elevation from 8,700 feet to 4,900 feet.

A fellow runner approached her during her run and suggested she take a break because she was visibly leaning to the side. Morris kept going.

“I was like, ‘I’m good, right? And then a couple of miles later I saw a lady on the ground with folks around her, and I thought, ‘OK, I’m going to walk now,’” Morris said. “I don’t want to be in that situation.”

Another time, Morris dealt with a hip injury and said one doctor told her it was time for her to stop running. Then, Morris sought out a second opinion from a doctor who also ran, and they made a plan for her to get back to running marathons. 

Seeing the states

Morris had to carefully map out her marathon quest to make it as efficient as possible. 

Sometimes that meant making solo trips to states, and finding marathons close to airports and hotels for ease of travel. 

Other times that meant running multiple marathons in a few days' time to cross off as many states as she could. 

Her first marathon trip by herself came in the Boston Marathon in 2007. She had planned to run it with a friend, but when her friend was injured shortly before the race, Morris didn’t back out.

“I didn’t realize at the time the esteem people put on it,” she said. “It was just, ‘Oh, look, they let me in, and I’m going to run.’ That took me out of my comfort zone because there was a Nor’Easter coming through and I was running through the rain and sleet. I just kept my head down to keep the rain off me and someone said, ‘Hey, you made it up Heartbreak Hill,’ and I was like, ‘Oh?’”

Another unique challenge came in the Anchorage Mayor's Marathon in Alaska in June 2017. Morris was planning to run after the marathon to stay in shape, but once she heard that a local runner had been chased and killed by a bear, she decided to call off any additional runs. 

Now that Morris has completed her journey of running a marathon in each state, she’s fulfilled, but she is also questioning what’s next.

She said she needs to run three more marathons by next year to have run 65 marathons by her 65th birthday, and might expand her travels beyond the United States.