Wedding Band Lost in New York City Marathon Found and Returned to Runner

— -- One runner recovering from Sunday’s New York City Marathon is walking with a particular bounce in his step thanks to the kindness, and sharp eyes, of a race volunteer.

Maurizio Martinoli, of Rome, finished his first New York City Marathon in 3 hours and 12 minutes, only to discover that he had lost his wedding band somewhere along those 26.2 miles.

“I didn’t have any idea where I could have lost it, if it was at the end at the beginning, the middle,” Martinoli, 36, told WABC. “There’s no way I’m going to find it again.”

Martinoli turned to social media for help finding his rin,g engraved with his wife’s initials. He posted a plea for help on the Facebook page of the New York Road Runners (NYRR).

Martinoli’s help was not online, however, but out on the course, in the form of a 24-year-old volunteer from Brooklyn who helped clean up the course after the race.

The volunteer, Ornella Alexander, found the ring in the post-finish-line area in Central Park and turned it in to NYRR officials.

The ring was returned to Martinoli on Monday and, the following day, the runner got a chance to thank Alexander in person.

“Thank you so much,” Martinoli said to Alexander, handing her flowers. “You made me the happiest man in the world.”

Alexander called it “crazy” that she found the wedding band among the thousands of items discarded by the over 50,000 runners who finished the race.

"I was picking up heat sheets off the floor and that's when I saw it," Alexander told ABC News today. "It was between sheets and fell out."

"I was like, 'Oh my gosh somebody lost their ring. They probably think they'll never find it again.'"

While Alexander called herself "not a hero," Martinoli and his wife, Carlotta Baccolimi, begged to differ with Alexander's humility.

“The New York people are so, so kind,” Baccolimi told WABC.

“It is unbelievable,” Martinoli said. “I couldn’t really hope that someone would find the ring and return it to me.”

When Martinoli shared the good news on Facebook Monday - "guys, the impossible became possible!," he wrote -- the post was liked nearly 10,000 times.

"They were so happy," Alexander said of the couple. "It shocked me to think that a ring could make someone so happy. I'm glad that I was able to do something for them."