Sacramento Running News

This weekend, Mary Coordt of Elk Grove, known to many local runners as “that woman in front of me” finished 2nd place in Sunday’s IAU World 50Km championships.

The race, held in Galway City, Ireland, included a deep field of the world’s best ultra distance runners.

In the process of her silver finish, Coordt, 41, has tentatively set a new American masters record of 3:28:30, besting Oregonian Kami Semick’s time of 3:29:47 from last year’s championship on the island of Gibraltar.

The weather was fine up until race day which brought wind and rain, says Coordt. “But the worst was the cars and exhaust…and I got almost hit twice, had to stop. And no one to run with for the entire 50k!”

The top woman was Susan Harrison of Great Britain, who finished in a rather brisk 3:15:42.

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Over the past few years, the Race for the Arts 5K has managed to remake itself from a unique Friday evening, race in downtown to just another Saturday morning 5K in Land Park.

Still, Land Park is a great place to run a 5K and the weather was perfect, so a good crowd assembled to take on the event and support local arts organizations.

Did I mention the weather was perfect? For last year’s race, we “enjoyed” high temps and Gulf Coast-like humidity. This year, it was absurdly cool for late August–about 59 degrees at the start–and clouds filled the sky. It was a perfect fall morning, about a month early.

The overall event seemed larger this year, and the race organization made use of the park’s amphitheater for showcasing local performers. Young opera singers serenaded us as we warmed up and a rock-band was on the stage as we cooled down.

Many of the usual (fast) suspects were on hand for the start and once all the kids that went out at a sub-5:00 per mile pace faded, local speedsters Steven Schenck and Mike Styczynski battled it out for first.

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Ranger Ollie

Anyone who runs on the parkway should become a regular reader of the monthly County Ranger Activity Report (PDF). You are guaranteed to learn something.

They read like life in miniature–filled with comedy, tragedy, stupidity, and just plain oddness. And flashers.  Always with the flashers.

You can subscribe to these yourself by following the link on the bottom of the About Rangers page on the County Parks website.

Over the years, many of us wanting to start our runs along the river at Hazel Avenue have been migrating from the parking lot at the Nimbus Fish Hatchery to the parking lot at the CSUS Aquatic Center. 

Even though I’ve never seen the lot full except for during boat races (when they charge), it looks like that will no longer be an option as the Aquatic Center staff will begin restricting parking to their clients and staff. 

According to the Aquatic Center website:

General Public that wishes to recreate i.e.; swim, paddle their own boats, picnic, should do so at the Nimbus Flats State Park. The Aquatic Center parking lot (inner & outer lot) is reserved for Aquatic Center Patrons.

They are in the process of installing signs indicating this policy and staff at the Aquatic Center stated they would have employees posted at the entrance of their parking area directing folks away to the Fish Hatchery or Nimbus Flats–probably starting September 1st.

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Hopefully, we’ve all had the experience of buying running shoes at a real running store. If you are a new runner, or asking for help, the salesperson will have you stand with your shoes off and look at your feet and advise you about a shoe that will best fit your needs. (The better shoe stores will put you in the shoes and actually watch you run in them.)

In the US Military, the most typical injuries for new recruits are running related. To address this, they decided to evaluate the feet of recruits and supply them with shoes that shoe companies promote for the recruits’ foot shape.

Normally, the story would stop there.  However, this time the Marine Corps decided to actually test the results and see how these recruits fared.  It turns out the results were about the opposite of what the shoe companies would have liked. The New York Times reports: (more…)

The County will begin repairs to the American River Parkway trail between Howe and Watt Avenue beginning August 30th.

It appears the levee top road will be available for running and biking.  You can get more information, including detour maps, from the County’s website.

Thanks to Carol and Phil for the tip!

The 09-10 Montrail Cup ended in June with the Western States 100, but the 10-11 Montrail Cup began Saturday with the Where’s Waldo 100Km in Williamette Pass, Oregon.

Some of the top US ultrarunners lined up again this year and a few local standouts ended up with top-flight results.

After declining to defend his 2009 Tahoe Rim Trail 100 mile championship (3-weeks after Western States 100), Erik Skaden took on Where’s Waldo and finished 4th overall in 10:21, closely followed at 10:28 by a surging Mark Lantz who came in 5th overall and top master.

The overall winner of the men’s race was Timothy Olsen, who came in at 9:25. The women’s winner was 49-year-young Meghan Arbogast, coming in at 10:52.

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Once again the streets of River Park were filled Saturday with a happy mix of fitness enthusiasts and some of Sacramento’s fastest women at the Susan B. Anthony 5K. And just like last year, top local speedsters Midori Sperandeo and Mary Coordt battled it out and finished 1, 2 with only few seconds between them.   Although if you were looking for them to slow down you’d be disappointed as this year they shaved a dozen seconds off last year’s winning time, coming in at an eye-popping 17:33 and 17:36!

This being one of very few women-only races in the region, it attracts some of the top local talent.  There were 20 women running under seven-minute miles!

With seven finishers in the 70+ age bracket (including the always amazing Barbara Miller who finished in 23:51) you can guess the race caters to all participants and this year’s race was bigger than ever, with over 450 finishers. Complete results are here.

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You may have heard the old (and by old I mean ancient) expression: A sound mind in a sound body.  Or, as the Romans said, way back in Roman times, Mens sana in corpore sano. Well, according to some recent research findings, it turns out the two really are linked.  An article in Health Day states:

People with the highest cardiac output for their body size (cardiac index), meaning those with the greatest blood flow from their heart, tended to have more brain volume, which generally indicates a healthier brain.

In fact, the researchers said that people with the lowest cardiac output showed nearly two more years of brain aging than did those with the highest cardiac output.

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