Marathon Pundit: Suspected pipe bomb detonated near finish line of Pittsburgh Marathon

Running 26.2 miles is enormously challenging...but luckily participants in today's Pittsburgh Marathon didn't have to confront what may have been a pipe bomb.

Runners were redirected around the suspected bomb, and the device, which KDKA-TV describes as a pipe bomb inside a microwave, was detonated by the Pittsburgh Police bomb squad.

Thanks to Marathon Pundit reader Vince of Chicago's Northwest Side for the story tip.

UPDATE 7:00pm CDT: The device was not believed to be a bomb, according to a Fox News report. It's hard to believe, but other races have had on-the-spot course changes--a bomb threat at a nursing home caused a 5k race to alter its route in 2006, and a year earlier, the prestigious Army 10-Miler became a non-competitive run when a suspicious-looking backpack was found on the course in Washington DC. Both incidents were false-alarms.

Related post:

My 20th consecutive Chicago Marathon

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