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Sunita Williams will run a Marathon in Space<br /><br /><font color="orange">BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- Zooming through low-Earth orbit at 17,500 mph, Suni Williams completes the standard marathon distance every 5.4 seconds.<br /><br />But for next month's Boston Marathon, the U.S. Navy commander will run the equivalent distance on a treadmill -- 210 miles (338 kilometers) above Earth in the international space station, and tethered to her track by bungee cords so she does not float away.<br /><br />"She thought it would be cool if she gave it a try," said Williams' sister, Dina Pandya, who will run the race the traditional way with almost 24,000 other runners. "She said, 'I'll call you on Heartbreak Hill.' "<br /><br />Although the world's oldest annual marathon starts at 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT) on Earth, Williams might not be able to run at that time because her sleep schedule -- a fairly arbitrary matter in space -- is set for the arrival of a Soyuz mission.<br /><br />"I'm not sure the timing will be that she'll be awake," Pandya said. "They're going to be on Russian time, so they're kind of sleep-shifting."<br /><br />Williams, 41, qualified for the Boston race by finishing last January's Houston Marathon in 3 hours, 29 minutes, 57 seconds. On December 9, Williams took off on the space shuttle Discovery, and it became clear she was not going to make it to the starting line.<br /><br />"I considered it a huge honor to qualify, and I didn't want my qualification to expire without giving it a shot," Williams told the Boston Athletic Association, which organizes the race.<br /><br />The BAA offered to send an official entrant's bib and a special finisher's medal -- made without lead, per NASA orders -- to the space station. But when this month's launch of the shuttle Atlantis was postponed, Williams had to be e-mailed a bib that she can print out; the other souvenirs will have to wait.<br /><</safety_wrapper></font> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font size="2" color="#ff0000"><em><strong>I'm a recovering optimist - things could be better.</strong></em></font> </p> </div>