As his knees buckled with five miles to go in the half-marathon, Chicago police Detective Greg Jacobson focused on the five colleagues he had recently lost in the line of duty.
Mile 9 was for Sgt. Alan Haymaker, mile 10 for Officer Thomas Wortham IV, mile 11 for Officer Thor Soderberg, mile 12 for Officer Michael Bailey and the last one for Officer Michael Flisk, Jacobson said, his voice breaking with emotion.
"Whenever you're in trouble, you always count on another officer coming to your help," he said. "At mile 8 1/2, I was in a little bit of trouble so I called on these guys to get me through it — and they did."
All of the events this year, St. Jude, The Run to Remember, Police Memorial Week here and in Washington, the motorcycle runs, all of them are going to be tinged with memories of a very painful year just past.