86-Year-Old Marathoner Dies After Completing 25th New York City Race

She took a fall midway through the race, but refused to call it quits

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Jonathan Sprague / Redux

An 86-year-old marathon runner died Monday after completing her twenty-fifth New York City Marathon a day earlier.

Joy Johnson, of San Jose, Calif., collapsed Monday, but not before following her after-Marathon ritual of standing outside the Today show studios in New York with her medal, where she spoke with weatherman Al Roker, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Johnson took a fall around mile 16 of Sunday’s race, cutting up her face, but she refused to go to the hospital and completed the run in 7:57:41, her daughter told the Journal Tuesday.

Johnson, who spent two hours a day training, didn’t start running until 1985.

[Wall Street Journal]