Sarann Mock (Patrick reddy photo) | ZOOM |

        For a week in November, Sarann Mock labored near ground zero in Manhattan, giving massages.

        Almost everyone needed one.

        “Everybody there is really hurting,” says the 70-year-old licensed massage therapist from Hyde Park.

        She loosened the tight muscles of firefighters, police officers and rescue personnel. Of construction workers, students and homeless people.

        Mrs. Mock, who is also a registered nurse, traveled to New York as a member of the Ohio Massage Therapist Disaster Response Team. Her duty included working in the fire house of Engine 24, Ladder 5, which lost 11 firefighters in the World Trade Center attack.

        “I felt very privileged to be doing it,” the married mother of 10 says.

        She saw many tears being shed, and she shed some of her own. But make no mistake. She is a strong woman. Mentally and physically.

        Mrs. Mock started running 20 years ago, at age 50. “I had more endurance than speed, so I went into longer distance running,” she says. First, she ran marathons, which are 26 miles, 385 yards. Then, ultra-marathons, which are longer, and vary in distance.

        She has run on all seven continents, competing in an equal number of marathons and ultra marathons, more than 100 in all.

        Mrs. Mock inspired one of her daughters to run her first marathon in New Zealand on Jan. 1, 2000. “Many people would pick up their pace when a smiling 70-year-old would pass them,” said Patricia Heyd, who nominated her mother for torchbearer.

        Mrs. Mock's longest run was 100 miles. “I only did one of those,” she says, laughing. It was five years ago, and she accomplished it in 28 1/2 hours.

        Afterward, she felt weariness, but not pain. Pain is what she found last month in New York City.

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