Sacramento Running News

Jane Kibii takes 2nd! (Photo courtesy of Erik Aguilar/Painani.org)

By John Schumacher

Volha Mazuronak’s surge down the stretch produced a women’s course record and Jacob Chemtai’s late move delivered a personal best en route to individual titles on a cool, fast Sunday at the California International Marathon.

Mazuronak, from Belarus, pulled away from Colfax’s Jane Kibii in the final seven miles to win the women’s race in 2 hours, 27 minutes and 33 seconds, shattering the 15-year-old course record of 2:29:21 set by Australian Nickey Carroll.

Chemtai, a Kenyan living in Santa Fe, N.M., dropped Zambia’s Jordan Chipangama and Kenyan Kiplangat Terer in the closing miles to win the men’s race in 2:11:57, the eighth-fastest time in the race’s 32-year history.

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The Countdown: (L-R) Luis Alvarez, R.D. Greg Soderlund, Assistant R.D. Craig Thornley, and Mike Saling are getting ready for the big day. (From the WS Facebook page)

Of all the many races in the region, there is only one of international importance: The Western States Endurance Run.

Even though there are bigger races, and faster courses, the Western States 100 has history and prestige by the bucket-full.

The race gets more media coverage than any other in the region.

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Strictly speaking, the San Francisco Marathon isn’t a local race–but a lot of locals run it. For that reason, I’ll usually poke through the results to see if I recognize any local runners.

While I didn’t spot any familiar locals among the top finishers, I did notice something peculiar. There were a lot of ultrarunners in the top men and women.

The overall winner was Michael Wardian, who was only a few weeks off his 3rd place finish at Badwater.

Chris Knorzer, in 5th place, has also dabbled in ultrarunning and had run the Tahoe Rim Trail 50K on July 16th. (Actually, Knorzer can’t be a real ultrarunner because he doesn’t have a blog.)

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