A Latino Marathoner Outruns a Childhood of Poverty

*Great story! Fernando Cabada will be running today’s Boston Marathon. He’s a world-class runner, and his story is inspiring. VL

By Linsay Crouse, The New York Times

Fernando Cabada — a poor Latino from one of the rougher neighborhoods in Fresno, Calif. — is the first to acknowledge that he will be an unusual front-runner for Monday’s Boston Marathon.

“I was born to fail,” he said.

Even so, Cabada has quietly transformed himself into one of the best distance runners in the United States, and one of the best Hispanic athletes the country has ever seen. He has accomplished this in obscurity, a persistently ascendant outsider in an American distance running culture dominated by participants who are white and more affluent. And he has done it despite a childhood dotted with reliance on food stamps and public housing, and a prison-bound father who tormented Cabada when he was not absent altogether.

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[Photo courtesy of Fernando Velez Cabada Facebook]