#2 Mike Bruno

I have know this guy since 1968, he is my original “running mate”. Everything that we did, we turned it into a competition that always escalated just short of bloodshed.

Mike is the forth (and final) member of this list that graduated from Kiski Area High School, class of 1986. He was a four year letter winner in cross country and three years in track. Mike captained both squads his senior year, basically coaching the cross country team as long time coach, Chuck Hauser retired and a teacher with no coaching or running experience took over.

As a high school senior, between cross country and track seasons, he would skip school and drive an hour to Robert Morris and play basketball in the old gym. He was there so much that the person in charge of the gym asked him to make sure everybody that was playing was a student there. After basketball, he would sneak in the cafeteria, have a late lunch and be home at the same time as if he went to school.

So it was just natural that he would be the third member of the Robert Morris Cross Country team from Kiski. His freshman year, RMC won the conference title and Mike was the fifth man on the team and finished 15th overall and was the first freshman to finish (there was not a newcomer/freshman of the year award back then). Followed up by two All-Conference awards; 6th place his sophomore year (RMC won the team title again) and 5th place his junior season. Mike was named team captain both his junior and senior seasons. In track, he was a two time All-Conference performer in the 3000 meters with an 8:28 his senior year (the Northeast Conference did not outdoor track yet). In 1987, he ran the Pittsburgh Marathon in 2:42 (it fell at the end of track season).

During the next school year, Mike had an internship at the Pittsburgh Marathon. He got the to run with Bill Rogers and Joan Benoit-Samuelson and several of the women’s Olympic Trail qualifiers as the 1988 marathon was the Trails for women.

Mike’s post college road racing career had a few victories. His favorite is the 1992 Spring Thaw 20 miler that he won in 1:53. His 5K personal best is 15:25 and 10K is 32:02.

He was a Keystone State games silver medalist in two different sports: in 1990 he finished second in the 10,000 meters on the track and 12 years later was half of the runners up in Beach Volleyball.

My brother made a return to serious running in 2013, when he ran the Pittsburgh Marathon in 3:43, BLINDFOLDED! He repeated the feat the next years raising thousands for charity. In 2016, he pushed his daughter, Cassie (she is blind and has autism) in a stroller and finished in 3;29 and two weeks later ran the Cleveland Marathon in 3:08. In 2017, Mike and Cassie finished the Children’s Marathon, they don’t know their finishing place, but they did end up on ESPN SportsCenter’s Top 10 Plays of the Day at #8.

When Mike first started running in junior high, I would run with him occasionally. The summer before his freshman year in high school, I began helping him with different aspects of the sport. When I was home in the summers from college, he became a true training partner. When he joined me at Robert Morris, he had no trouble adjusting to the pace or the jump in mileage (that made me feel proud). After he graduated, we used to hammer each other in some workouts. They always started out nice and relaxed but quickly escalated into seeing who could inflict more pain on whom. To give an example, we once ran a 15 mile run in North Park (3 five mile loops), the first loop 32 minutes, the second was at 29:30 and the third was 27:00. I used to relish those kinds of runs with him. But it wasn’t until 2016, when he motivated to start training seriously again. If it wasn’t for him, I would be about 20 pounds heavier and running 10-15 miles per week. I don’t think he will ever realize what an impact he had/has on my running.

Mike is enjoying small town living in Ford City, PA where he is the Director of Tourism for Armstrong County.