One of New Hampshire's faster Boston Marathon runners is also an inspiration to the 1,600 students at Nashua High School North, as well as the school's 200 staff members.Principal Nate Burns is ready to run his fourth Boston Marathon.The day for a high school principal and assistant track coach is long. Burns arrives at school around 6:30 a.m., and, best-case, he's there until 4:30, but often much later. That workday makes his training schedule all the more impressive."I'm up really early in the morning," he said. "You know, there's no guarantee as a high school principal that there's going to be time after school.">> Download the free WMUR app to get updates on the go: Apple | Google Play <<Burns gets up by 4 a.m. every school day and gets a run-in before the sun comes up. Twice a week, he runs after work, as well, with a long run on Saturday.He's averaging about 70 miles per week with Sundays off. He said that last year, he ran 2,600 miles.All the work has paid off. Burns' personal best at Boston is 2 hours, 52 minutes, 22 seconds."You know, I like to compete and win when I go out to race, but it's more how do I get better every day, you know?" Burns said. "And that's the biggest thing that I want. Everybody is able to get better. You've just got to work a little bit at each thing as you as you go forward and day by day."That dedication is how you become a Boston Marathon qualifier. The sport has always been a big part of his life, running at Nashua High School back in the day and then at Boston University.He has run nine marathons, including New York City in 2022 and Chicago last fall.But Boston is different, and when he runs on Marathon Monday, his students will be following his progress on the course."It might be a math class following and talking about my pace per mile," he said "It might just be kids tracking me or seeing where things are at. But it's really nice to have a supportive community around me here."Burns sets a big-time example for his students that you can dream big, set big goals and get them done."I had trouble qualifying for Boston. It took me several tries," he said. "The first marathon I went to was an utter disaster.""You know, it's that resilience piece," he went on. "It's that opportunity to just kind of keep going back to it and knowing that if you work hard enough or you want something hard enough that you can really get at it."