This, then, is the pull of Boston, a chance to drink from the same deep cup of history as every great marathoner who has come before, every great champion who has run on exactly these same streets, whose dreams similarly have come true or been dashed over the daunting distance. The roads that make up the Boston Marathon hold the ghosts which define the sport and which unite all runners in a community of suffering and triumph. Name, if you can, another such event in any other sport.