Submitted photo. Warren native and former Howland standout Vince Mauri crosses the finish line at the Glass City Marathon on Sunday in Toledo.

BOARDMAN — As Vince Mauri made his way to the Glass Bowl on the University of Toledo’s campus, it was right about then that he realized he was in position for a good time.

However, he didn’t expect it to be a history-making run. Mauri isn’t an experienced marathon runner, but the Warren native and former Howland standout ran a 2:05:54.21 at the Glass City Marathon on Sunday.

He won the race by nearly 16 minutes and completely shattered the record time. The race’s previous mark was set by Adam Beucler, who ran 2:19.31.87 last year, according to the Toledo Blade. His time officially made Mauri the fourth-fastest American marathoner ever. He also broke the state record by more than 13 minutes.

“Coming in (the stadium), it was pretty emotional,” Mauri said. “Everything was hurting, but seeing that clock gave me a little bit of light back in the eyes. Any doubt that I had was gone. I knew it was a life-changing event.

“It was a pretty good rationalization of what I had been doing for so long is what I’ve been meant to do.”

Mauri’s marathon debut also put him in position for the Olympic Trials. The qualifying time for the trials was 2:16:00.00.

“I’ve qualified for the trials by just over 10 minutes now,” Mauri said. “It was a pretty big solidification that I should be in that field, and anything on top of that is really getting ready to knock out another fast mark and really compete with people so I can be in that top three (to qualify for the Olympics).”

COMING BACK HOME

Marathon running is completely different from what Mauri was used to.

A 2019 Howland graduate, Mauri won state in the 3200 as a senior (9:07.47), finishing his senior year unbeaten in the event. He took silver in the 3200 (9:04.59) the year prior. Also in 2018, he took fourth at the state cross country championships.

From there, he went on to run for Arizona State and earned his degree in biomedical engineering. He later transferred to Notre Dame as a graduate student and concluded his education last year.

He made his way back to the Mahoning Valley not too long after that. The grind of being a college athlete took a toll. He wanted a reset, and he thought he could find it back home.

Mauri was looking for somewhere to work, and he got an offer to join Second Sole in Boardman.

It made sense. He had shopped there when he lived in the area, and his experience and knowledge from the track and the classroom could be put to use.

That’s when something a little unexpected happened.

Mauri developed a renewed drive for running, and that’s when marathons caught his eye.

“I just love being back home,” Mauri said. “It was nice to be with family, instead of being so far away. (Not) having to worry about holidays and anything crazy that you have to get back home for and you can’t get back home for. So it was a nice little way to reset and figure out what I want to do with my life, and Sunday pretty much solidified it.”

A NEW MOUNTAIN TO CLIMB

Mauri doesn’t have a coach or train with a team. He took on the responsibility himself, and he started by identifying his strengths and weaknesses.

He fell back on some of the lessons he learned over the years, focusing on the things he enjoyed about running. He wanted consistency, structure, intensity and specificity in his training approach. He blended those four factors and brought them to several parks and trails, all in the immediate Youngstown-Warren area.

“It felt familiar for a while,” Mauri said of his fitness in Toledo. “That’s really what I (worked) my training around. How familiar can we make this feel? For how long? I feel like I got to half way through the marathon, a little bit past that, feeling like I didn’t practice. Just another day, but a little bit earlier in the morning and a little bit longer of an effort.”

With Sunday being his first marathon, Mauri is taking the conservative approach. He’s not immediately thinking of the next race. Instead, he’s opting to see how his body reacts over time.

The slight break will also give him a chance to see how he can improve on his performance moving forward.

“I’ve found a lot of success from being consistent these past six months. And also, I haven’t found success when I try to bite off more than I can chew sometimes,” Mauri said. “When I’m not consistent and I’m under-training, I’m under-fueling, I’m under-eating … it’s not a great day for me. How to find a consistent basis is kinda the name of the game.”

Mauri has a new goal, a “mountain,” as he put it. He wants to get to the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles and see how far he can take marathon running.

He admitted that he would need an “A-plus day” to reach that level and he will need to add some experience, but it’s a new challenge he’s excited to undertake.

“It is a new world for me right now,” Mauri said. “But it really was a life-changing kind of time to get to run that fast. To show the fitness that I’ve built, not in the last six months, not in the last year, but in the last 10 years or 12 years of running.”