Kevin Pool winning the 2010 Run to Feed the Hungry
Folsom’s Kevin Pool finished 9th overall in this morning’s 2011 Dodge Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego Marathon, running a personal best 2:19:52!
As of the time of this post, the only results I can find are the leaderboard, and individual tracking at Competitor.com.
Pool is also the director of the CIM Relay.
The World Masters Athletics Championships (AKA World Masters Track and Field Champs) are a little more than a month away and there is excitement in the air. It’s a little like you’re a kid waiting for Christmas, except maybe you’re hoping that Santa Claus is going to bring you that massive track meet you’ve always wanted!
(I suppose I should task the interns with rounding up some better metaphors.)
Most of the venues are pretty easy to figure out. One world-class track is pretty much the same as another. The critical question for most of the events is: What’s the weather going to be like? (It’ll be July in Sacramento so the odds are good it will be warm and sunny.)
The weather is still cool and a December marathon seems a world away.
It’s hard to believe you might need to be thinking about registering already, but if you want to run the California International Marathon for the “cheap” price of $85, you need to register before midnight on June 1st.
After June 1, 11:59 p.m. PST, the registration fee will increase to $105. The price remains $105 from June 2 until until the entry cap of 7,500 is achieved.
After June 1st, the price shoots up to $105, which seems like a lot until you realize that it’s only $4 per mile! (Okay. It still seems like a lot.)
Relay registration is already $105, but it goes up to $165 after August 1st.
Race organizers at the Pittsburgh Marathon brought in Jeffrey Eggleston to rabbit the leaders to a fast time.
After running his contracted 18 miles at Olympic Trials qualifying pace (sub 2:19 pace), Eggleston found himself running alone, but in visual contact of the lead pack.
He then threw down some faster miles, caught and passed the leaders for the overall win and a PR time of 2:16:40. Good times!
I could read stories like that all day. Read about it in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
Better yet, read about it in Eggleston’s blog.
If one were thinking of running a half marathon and wondering where one might find a race to place well (AKA “cherry picking”), one might think that a trip to the little valley town of Lodi might do the trick.
You could imagine the pleasant farming folk setting down their hoes, or parking their combine harvesters for the morning, lacing up some jogging shoes and trotting out an easy 13.1 miles. Then they might gather around a jug of fresh squeezed lemonade to chat about the new livestock auctioneer they’d seen at the county fair last summer. Or something like that.
Then you might actually run Lodi’s Avenue of the Vines Half-Marathon, or just look at the results, and notice that local running impresario Rich Hanna ran a 1:13:29 and still finished over four minutes behind winner Jose Morales, of Turlock, who ran 1:09:17!
To put that in perspective, imagine that you were running a 5:37/mile pace. Even if you were running that pace, the winner (i.e., Jose Morales) would be done and sipping on some of that fresh-squeezed lemonade and you would still have over a half-mile to run.
It must be spring! Not only am I sneezing every 30-seconds, it seems as though we were overwhelmed with races and tasty results to report on.
In track and field, Stanford was host to the 2011 Payton Jordan Cardinal Invitational, where the Hornets’ Lea Wallace turned out the 2nd fastest Division I 1500 of the year. Wallace, in her first 1500 of the season, ran 4:11.31. The only collegiate athlete ahead of her is Jordan Hasay (Oregon), who ran 4:10.28 in the same race this weekend. Letsrun.com has an excellent write-up about the event.
Up in Oregon on Sunday, Sacramento’s Jenny Hitchings ran a PR 2:46:10 in the Eugene Marathon–just 11 seconds shy of the Women’s Olympic Trials Marathon qualifying time. Hitchings was 5th woman overall, and 2nd masters behind Bend’s Kami “The Machine” Semick.
Speaking of close calls, at the Quicksilver 50K in San Jose, Jen Pfeifer, of El Dorado (former of Folsom), was reportedly in the lead until the final mile of the race where she went off course and picked up several extra minutes. While lost, Pfeifer was passed by a more attentive Adona Ramos, of San Jose. Ramos took the win with only about 15-seconds to spare.
Three thousand plus runners and walkers braved fierce winds along the river this morning at the Parkway Half Marathon and 5K.
Jeff Gardina, of Santa Clara, pulled off the half marathon win in a smoking 1:15:49. Chris Pollack, of Sacramento, and Jason Harne, of Folsom, earned 2nd and 3rd with 1:17:54 and 1:18:45.
The top woman was Kelly Wisnicky, of Fair Oaks, in 1:30:16. Rounding out the top three women were Jennifer Kent, of Sacramento, and Marrie Chen, of Davis, in 1:31:53 and 1:32:20.
In the 5K, the first in was Alex Diehl, of Lodi, in 16:25. The top woman, and 3rd overall, was Kimberly Williams, of Berkeley, in 18:26.
Rounding out the top women of the 5K were Sarah Carvill, of Santa Cruz, and Julia Christian, of Sacramento, in 23:12 and 25:08. The 2nd and 3rd men were Curt Casazza, of Cameron Park, and Kyle MacLachlan, of Eldorado Hills, in 18:13 and 21:44.
Did I mention that Kimberly Williams was third overall?
Ellie Greenwood and Kami Semick battle it out at the AR 50. Photo courtesy of Jean Pommier. http://fartherfaster.blogspot.com/
The weather was perfect and there were some races this past weekend!
Just under 700 runners toed the line at the American River 50, this Saturday. There was mud and vomiting. There was triumph and tragedy. You know–the usual ultrarunning scene.
Dave Mackey, of Boulder, was the overall winner in 5:55. Ellie Greenwood, of Banff, Alberta, Canada, AKA the 2010 World 100 km champion, was the women’s winner in 6:25.
Kami Semick, of Bend, Oregon, was the second woman, and Jen Pfiefer, of Folsom, was the 3rd woman. Pfeifer is rumored to be mulling over the entry to the Western States 100 she was awarded.
It seems the endless stormy weather is impacting yet another northern California race. This week, Big Sur International Marathon organizers announced:
On March 16th a forty foot section of Highway One collapsed making the road impassable between Carmel and Big Sur. We have created an alternate “out and back” course similar to what we did in 1998 for the Marathon, Relay and 21-Miler.
If you have questions about how this will affect your run at Big Sur, you should check their Course Q&A Page.
Believe it or not, it will eventually be spring and then soon enough we’ll be complaining about the oppressive heat of summer. Until then, be strong.
Unlike other major, big city marathons, the LA Marathon is not steeped in history, known to be particularly fast, or to draw the excitement of top national and international talent. But like so much of LA it is simply bursting with an excess of excess.
There was the new world record set for the heaviest marathon finisher. (Although, with a 9:48 finish time, I can’t really call it “running” the marathon. Most marathons have packed up well before then.)
They are celebrating the “McRunner” who ran a 2:36 after training on a 100% McDonald’s diet. Maybe all those running nutrition books aren’t worth their weight in oat fiber.
Los Angeles is supposed to be warm and sunny. Why were thousands of runners evaluated for hypothermia, with two dozen being hospitalized?
