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Runners fill Pine Trails Park in honor of Douglas Cross Country Coach Scott Beigel

Posted at 7:04 PM, Feb 20, 2018
and last updated 2018-02-20 19:19:45-05

More than a thousand runners ran laps around the amphitheater area of Pine Trails Park in honor of Scott Beigel, Stoneman Douglas cross country coach and geography teacher who died last week.

Beigel is the teacher who died as he tried to get students to safety inside his classroom. 

Chad Williams, a senior at Stoneman Douglas and a runner on the cross country team, shared a picture on Twitter of Coach Beigel with several members of the team. That pictured ended up getting thousands of likes and retweets. 

“It was his first year coaching and a lot of people didn’t know him because it’s his first year so I posted a picture on twitter and I received so much love," Williams said.

He said a running group in New Jersey saw that picture and started encouraging people nationally to run Tuesday in honor of Beigel.

People around the country ran in his honor, posting about it on social media using the hashtags #runwithcoachbeigel and #runwithmsdxc.

The Douglas cross country team coordinated Tuesday night's event at Pine Trails Park to give everyone locally a place to run and mourn together while honoring Beigel and the other 16 victims.