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Boston, MA
How Dropkick Murphys’ Jeff DaRosa found himself on the road to the Boston Marathon
Boston Marathon
After getting sober, the musician turned to running and found structure off the road.
On most days, somewhere between soundchecks and late-night sets, Jeff DaRosa laces up his running shoes and steps into a quieter world.
For nearly two decades, the 43-year-old has been a multi-instrumentalist for Dropkick Murphys, the Boston-bred Celtic punk band synonymous with packed venues and relentless touring — most recently with their new split album “New England Forever,” released March 17.
Discipline, by his own admission, was never part of that life.
But this April, he’ll take on a different kind of stage: the 2026 Boston Marathon, running in support of the Claddagh Fund — and, in many ways, for himself.
‘It’s kind of like a drug’
Running first entered DaRosa’s life casually — some 5Ks with his sister, a turkey trot, the occasional half marathon. It had a subtle pull.
“It’s kind of like a drug,” he said. “You just need a little more. You find it to be more attainable.”
Still, running Boston — one of the world’s most iconic races — felt distant. After the 2013 bombings, and the band’s performance at the Boston Strong benefit show, the idea lodged in the back of his mind.
“It was this weird fantasy,” he said. “Like, maybe one day.”
A turning point at 40
For years, the demands of touring kept the fantasy at bay. The band’s annual March run of St. Patrick’s Day shows always collided with marathon training season, making serious preparation impossible.
The shift came when DaRosa turned 40. He quit drinking — on Marathon Monday, coincidentally — and found himself craving something new.
“I was just a rock musician that kind of didn’t have much discipline in my life. All I had to do was be on stage,” he said.
Offstage, life was accelerating. A father of three, he felt time slipping.
“I was really craving to hold on a little tighter to life or something.”
Running became an antidote — a form of meditation, he said, that made him feel more present and grounded.
Starting over
Since getting sober, running has become both ritual and anchor — even on tour. He recently wrapped a five-week run of shows while training nearly every day.
His approach is simple: “I just wake up and go,” he said. “If I think, it totally stalls me out. I have a coffee. I go.”
In that repetition, he’s found what he’d been missing. “It’s been a life changer for me — the discipline I so badly craved.”
He trains mostly alone, though friends cheer him on and join him for the longer efforts when schedules align. Even mid-run, listening to music, his mind drifts to gratitude.
“The whole time, I’ll be thinking about how grateful I am for my kids,” he said. “It’s so weird.”
Lessons from the road — and the race
DaRosa ran his first marathon in 2024 at the Mesa Marathon in Arizona — an experience he called, with a laugh, “a disastrous situation.”
By mile 15 he was limping, and an 89-year-old runner beside him offered simple wisdom: that’s why they call it a marathon.
He finished anyway.
“Part of this experience for me is to show my kids that you work at something, and you can do it.”
That lesson reshaped how he sees the sport. The race itself, he’s come to believe, is almost beside the point. “It’s the training that is the true — I don’t know,” he paused. “It’s where you really find out about yourself, I think.”
Boston, at last
This year, the timing finally aligned. The band will be in Boston. The training is there. And an opportunity that once felt abstract is now real.
He’s keeping his expectations low, including his finishing time.
His one lighthearted goal: to beat Oprah’s marathon time — a 4:29:15 mark he narrowly eclipsed in Arizona.
“My friend wrote to me, ‘You beat Oprah,’” he said. “And I just laughed and laughed and laughed.”
But beneath the humor is something quieter, something more intentional. Running, he said, has brought him back to himself after decades lost in the noise of the road.
“Somewhere along the line, life just started to fly by,” he said. “I just wanted to hold on closer to it.”
For DaRosa, the Boston Marathon isn’t really about the finish line. It’s about showing up — for his kids, for himself, and for the version of his life he’s still shaping.
“To just be present,” he said. “That’s it.”
Boston, MA
With Columbia Threadneedle out, Boston Triathlon director is looking for a new sponsor – The Boston Globe
Michael O’Neil is on the hunt for the next John Hancock.
As many Boston sports fans know, the insurance company first sponsored the Boston Marathon 40 years ago, helping usher in the modern professional era of the race as well as tens of millions of dollars in community fund-raising each year.
O’Neil wants to make a similar leap for the race he runs, the Boston Triathlon. This will be the first year without a naming-rights sponsor after nine years with Ameriprise Financial-owned Columbia Threadneedle Investments. O’Neil is seeking a successor that can help make an impact on the race the way Hancock once did with the marathon, a sponsorship role now played by Bank of America.
“We’re looking for that next transformational partner that wants to do something like that,” O’Neil said.
The 18-year-old triathlon draws nearly 2,500 athletes to Carson Beach in South Boston each August, for sprint and Olympic-distance triathlons, and also features free kids’ races the day before at the same location; Amazon has been a big sponsor for the “Kids Day” events.
O’Neil says he would like to extend the race beyond loops in South Boston to showcase more of the city and boost tourism; the Meet Boston tourism bureau is also among the race’s sponsors. Another hope of O’Neil’s: to continue community efforts that he and his race management firm, Ethos, undertook with support from Columbia Threadneedle, including donations to Boston Medical Center and the city’s “Swim Safe” program to provide swim lessons for kids. (O’Neil started an affiliated nonprofit to help expand this community work in 2024.)
He expects the race’s naming-rights sponsorship to cost “in the mid-six figures” annually.
“We’re over this hump now, after 18 years, we’re an institution,” O’Neil said. “We’re seeking a Boston-based company, that’s headquartered here or has a large presence here, that wants to make an impact on the community. … We know how to do that.”
This is an installment of our weekly Bold Types column about the movers and shakers on Boston’s business scene.
Jon Chesto can be reached at jon.chesto@globe.com. Follow him @jonchesto.
Although it is just June 22, it’s certainly starting to seem like the Boston Red Sox could end up being sellers later on this summer when the 2026 Major League Baseball trade deadline gets here.
Boston took two out of three games from the Seattle Mariners over the weekend, but still finds itself 13 games under .500 at 31-44. Right now, Boston is six games out of an American League Wild Card spot as well. Boston needs a long winning streak to turn the tide. If not, the club will certainly trade pieces away. The conversation has gotten loud enough around the team that Red Sox starter Sonny Gray said he “would be open” to having a conversation about waiving his no-trade clause if someone from the club approached him about it to Tim Healey of The Boston Globe.
“If someone came to me from the Red Sox and made a decision that that’s the direction that this team was going to go, I would be open for a conversation,” Gray said to Healey. “Whatever happens from then, only time will tell. But I would be open for a conversation.
Could Sonny Gray Be The Next Star Out Of Boston?
“Holding veto power is ‘an earned thing’ and means a lot, Gray said. He negotiated it into the three-year, $75 million deal he signed with the Cardinals heading into 2024.”
When it comes to Gray, he has been a major addition for Boston so far this season. He has a 3.12 ERA in 13 starts to go along with a 55-to-17 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 69 1/3 innings pitched. Gray is also 8-1 on the season. Even in a campaign full of losses for Boston, Gray has been able to consistently be a stopper for the club.
If he were to become available, he would be an intriguing, although imperfect trade candidate. From a talent perspective, he’s awesome and would help a contender. But from a contract point of view, he has a $30 million mutual option for the 2027 season with a $10 million buyout. Mutual options rarely get picked up. The buyout is very high and could be a barrier. That will be a bridge to cross later on, though. What’s important to note right now is the fact that Gray is “open” to a conversation about a trade. It doesn’t mean that it will happen, but it’s possible.
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Boston, MA
Jets were 300 feet apart in Boston close call that forced Delta flight to abort landing, expert says
BOSTON (AP) — A Delta Air Lines jet was roughly 300 feet (90 meters) from an American Airlines plane during a close call at Boston’s airport that forced the Delta aircraft to abort a weekend landing attempt, an aviation expert said Sunday.
The Federal Aviation Administration said it was investigating the incident between two commercial flights that happened Saturday at Boston Logan International Airport.
Todd Curtis, a former safety engineer at Boeing, estimated the distance between the two jetliners using Flightradar24, a website that tracks flights. Curtis now coproduces a podcast about flight safety issues.
“This is a significant incident,” Curtis said, adding that it was particularly concerning because it involved two professional airline crews.
He said federal aviation officials have been concerned about such runway incursions for a while now and will scrutinize Saturday’s close call.
Near-misses and runway incursions at U.S. airports will be the subject of a hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday. The Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Aviation, Space, and Innovation will seek ways to strengthen safety across the national airspace system.
The Delta flight from Dallas had to execute a go-around, or aborted landing, to avoid the American plane departing from an intersecting runway, according to the FAA and flight logs.
The crew of Delta flight 2351 coordinated with air traffic control to perform the go-around, an airline spokesperson said. The plane, which had 129 passengers and six crew members on board, landed safely and deplaned normally, according to the spokesperson.
Go-arounds are safe, routine procedures performed at the discretion of the pilot or air traffic controllers, according to the FAA.
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