there were two sisters who decided to run the Walt Disney World Marathon. The younger sister, Kari, had already ran a marathon and was ready for her next challenge. But for the older sister, Erica, this was going to be her first marathon.

The two had decided to register for this race after the older sister had turned 26. She had the idea that 26 miles for 26 years seemed like a good idea. So, after informing their parents of this decision, both sisters hit the payment button and official signed up to run 26 miles in their favorite place.

Both trained individually and would check in periodically to see how training was going. The older sister almost didn’t make it to the starting line because four weeks prior to the race, she bruised her foot. But after getting advice from a doctor, she continued to stay active by swimming and biking and was assured she could toe the start line.

A week before the big race, the sisters went out to dinner with their parents. The conversation was about the race and how the two thought they would fair. As the night progressed, the topic changed to the Boston Marathon and how in order to run this prestigious race one must qualify by time or run for charity. Now the idea of a qualifying race piqued the interest of the sisters father. See the family had a competitive side. The two sisters and their brother had grown up as competitive swimmers and sometimes earned rewards for earning certain times at swim meets.

In that spirit, the father proposed a challenge. If one of the daughters qualified for the Boston Marathon they were to earn $5,000.00. To get more specific, the daughter only had to run the qualifying time for their age group at a qualifying marathon. They did not need to be accepted into the Boston Marathon (as that time can be faster based on the number of qualifiers in a year) or actually run Boston.

With a clink of glasses, the Kolsrud Challenge was born and the two sisters have been running marathons since.