By Celeste Katz Marston — Celeste@concordbridge.org
When she’s not working on some of Concord’s biggest issues — from the future of the prison property to a deep dive on how Town Meeting operates — town government’s Shannon McAndrew is a serious distance runner who sees the world 26.2 miles at a time.
“Each marathon I have done, I have had a very different experience [and] learned something about myself, positive or negative,” she tells The Concord Bridge.
“Some races, I was able to tap into something deeper than I may have thought I had, [and] some races, I maybe had less fight in me than I thought I had during my training,” McAndrew says. “Regardless of the experience on the day, 26.2 miles is a very long time to spend with your thoughts, and I would say it’s near guaranteed [to] finish and learn something new about yourself.”
This month, McAndrew plans to run in the Berlin Marathon as part of her mission to complete the World Marathon Majors Six Star challenge.
McAndrew will head to London for the city’s April 2025 marathon. To get there, she’s raising money for Rays of Sunshine Children’s Charity, which fulfills the wishes of ill kids in the U.K. and supports them in hospitals and hospices.
Miles to go
In her professional life, McAndrew until recently was executive assistant to Concord’s Select Board. She’s been promoted to management specialist.
“I’m now transitioning out of [the] direct support role for the Select Board [and] more directly working with the MCI-Concord Advisory Board, the Town Meeting Study Committee, the Concord 250 Committee,” she says. “I’m also going to be working a little more closely with [Deputy Town Manager] Megan Zammuto and her staff.”
McAndrew is with Heartbreak Hill Running Co.’s “Flyers” High Performance Team. Some days, she’s up early as a pacer for 6:30 a.m. workouts outdoors at the MIT Track and indoors at the Reggie Lewis Center.
Her first marathon was the iconic 2021 New York City race. She fundraised for non-profit Girls on the Run NYC, which helps to build confidence and counter gender stereotypes.
Her goal was to qualify for the Boston Marathon by completing the course in 3:30. Her finish was 2:58:51, which made her the third-fastest woman in her age group.
That same fall, McAndrew got lucky — she won a bib for the Chicago Marathon in a running club raffle. At that point, “I decided I was going to try to run all three U.S. World Marathon Majors in three hours or less within the one calendar year.”
In the 2022 Boston Marathon, McAndrew crossed the finish line in 3:00:08 — “or 2:59:26 if you didn’t count my bathroom pit stop at Mile 19!” Next came Chicago, which she ran just after she took her Concord government job and which remains her personal best record. She finished in 2:56:43.
McAndrew completed this year’s Boston Marathon in 2:59:57, which placed her in the women’s top 200. McAndrew will skip Boston’s 2025 race because it coincides with Concord’s semiquincentennial revolution festivities.
Origin story
Now 27, McAndrew was a standout athlete in her hometown of Chicopee. She went on to a four-year Division 1 career at Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, where she became the school record holder in the outdoor track 10,000 meters. She subsequently did two years of D1 athletics while in grad school at UMass Amherst.
McAndrew says hitting the road with people she likes elevates the experience.
When she first moved to Boston, she knew few people and often ran alone. “I didn’t realize how much I actually wasn’t enjoying that until I [got] introduced to some people that I’m very good friends with and run with a lot now,” she says. “I was like, ‘Wow, I don’t know how I ever was running like that on my own all the time.’”
When she runs before heading to work in Monument Square, she’ll hop out of bed at 5:30 a.m. “A lot of us live near the river, so we’ll just pick a bridge [to] meet at, and then we’ll maybe do anywhere from eight to 12 miles.”
She fully recognizes that is not a lifestyle for everyone, but “it just feels like part of my routine,” she says. “I just feel good. I have a good time. Sometimes it doesn’t feel so good because I’m tired — I had a Select Board meeting the night before or whatever.”
Even after a recent 5½-hour flight to Seattle, McAndrew couldn’t wait to hit the road. “We get in, and it’s 70 degrees, sunny, no humidity, and I go for a run, and I’m like, ‘Wow, that was amazing.’”
Her training regimen sometimes takes her to the Emerson track and the Battle Road or Reformatory Trails, where out-of-context encounters can come as a surprise.
“I’ve only seen a couple residents that I know when I’ve been out on the trail, and I recognized them right away,” she says with a laugh. “I think I caught them super off guard because I waved at them, and I think they just had never seen me before outside of a work experience.”
Find McAndrew’s London Marathon fundraising page at justgiving.com/page/shannonmcandrew.
