They're off! Runners start of the 10Km. (SRN photo)
Like the cherry blossoms around the duck pond, the Zoo Zoom is a sure sign of spring in Land Park.
Conditions were perfect today–sunny and warm–for a fast run in the park.
Kevin Pool and Stacey Worthen were the winners in the 5Km, in 15:02 and 18:45.
Tesfaye Alemayehu on his way to victory in 47:34. (SRN photo.)
There was a time in the not too distant past, where 60-minutes for a ten mile run was the demarcation line between serious and non-serious runners. The local Buffalo Stampede 10 mile race would produce a bushel of sub-60 minute finishes, and the Stockton’s California 10 wouldn’t even give you a shirt unless you broke 60-minutes.
While local races still usually deliver a few speedy times, the crowd is pretty thin when you get under six minutes per mile.
As I’ve written before, a little prize money goes a long way. Now, with this year’s $15,000 prize purse and PAUSATF grand prix status, the Sactown 10 delivers as a serious, competitive race.
Registration closes at midnight tonight!
This past spring, I was visiting Washington D.C. and asked the hotel concierge for suggestions on where to run the next morning.
“Well,” she said. “A lot of people run around the Mall, but the Cherry Blossom Run is tomorrow and it might be crowded.”
“Oh!” I said. “A race! Maybe I could run that.”
I could see the smirk form on her face before she looked up from the map she was doodling on.
The lead pack after 8-miles: Gary Gellin, Rich Hanna, Shaun Martin and Sam Robinson
This past weekend featured two of the regions most popular races.
On Saturday, over 700 ultrarunners, including some of the top names in the sport, lined up near the Cool Firehouse for a go at the remarkably dry Way Too Cool 50K.
This was the second running on a new and designed to be faster course. For last year’s debut of the new course, mud was the theme of the day and thigh-deep stream crossings kept a lid on the pace.
Huh?
I’m not sure how I missed a race that encourages you to run in your underpants, but there it was in today’s Bee.
I’m happy to see the Bee covering a local race–but kind of sad it has to be because of a gimmick like running in underpants.
Oh well.
Results are here.
The Napa Valley Marathon was this morning and if you were hoping for a top-spot, you had better have brought your long-game. A quick survey of the results shows a surprising number of the region’s top ultrarunners among the top finishers.
The winning woman was San Francisco’s Devon Crosby-Helms, whose 2:39:37 appears to be a new course record. According to my March issue of Ultrarunning, Crosby-Helms is also the woman who ran the fastest 100Km in the North America last year. (7:46:33 at the Mad City 100Km)
I don’t recognize any of the other top women, but the men’s field was stacked with some of the top ultra guys.
Huh?
Last Sunday morning, Scott Downard pinned on a race bib for the Cowtown Marathon (the one in Fort Worth, Texas) and ran 2:31:40 and was the first across the finish line by six minutes.
The trouble was that the bib Downard was wearing was actually that of a friend who couldn’t make the race.
In what was no doubt an awkward moment for everyone involved, Doward, according to the Star Telegram, admitted “without any prompting” that the bib wasn’t his.
Race management disqualified Downard for not being a registered runner and instead awarded the win to Kolin Styles, who was the next to finish in 2:37:53.
While this seems to be a pretty odd story, apparently the exact same thing happened at the 2003 race!
Read the whole sad story in the Star-Telegram.
You are probably by now aware that the Olympic Marathon trials were held in Houston this past Saturday.
During your long run this morning, you may have asked your running buddies something like, “I wonder how that woman from our club did? I think her name is Susan. Or maybe it’s Suzanne. I’m not quite sure but, you know, she’s has kind of brown hair and is kind of skinny? You know who I’m talking about?”
No. I don’t know, but I did look through the results and tried to pick out as many locals as I could find and collected their results here.
It is one of my core beliefs that very few runners ever achieve all they are capable of.
There are many reasons for this, but often it’s simply that people don’t realize that they are capable of doing more and going faster.
Running is one of the few things in life that consistently and generously rewards you for diligent, and intelligent effort.
Of course, no matter how hard you train, to be an elite runner you need to have some talent. But how will you know whether you have the talent unless you push yourself a bit?
There are many exciting stories coming out of the Olympic Trials Marathon, but this has to be one of my favorites.
