Sacramento Running News

Dan Weintraub chases Marie Sample to the finish line.

It’s been a week since the marathon and it seems like a good time to  finally wrap up the news on the event. Hopefully it was worth the wait as we’ve got a bucket-full of fun facts for you!

The weather was close to perfect for this time of year. Although the streets were wet from the previous night’s deluge, the rain quit before the start and waited to resume until later in the afternoon.

Dylan Wykes, a Canadian, led wire-to-wire for the win in 2:12:39. Ethiopian Buzunesh Deba, the defending women’s champion, was first woman in 2:32:13.  Read what the Bee’s John Schumacher has to say about it.

For a more entertaining discussion about the race, as it was happening, you can read the posts on the Canadian running discussion board MileSplit. (Think LetsRun but with more “Eh?”)

Fastest Locals? The fastest local was Rocklin’s Charlie Brenneman who ran a personal best 2:35:45. The fastest local woman, and top local masters woman, was Sacramento’s Jenny Hitchings who ran 2:50:29, also a personal best. The first local masters man was Ed Randolph, also of Sacramento, who finished in 2:41:19.

Results! If for some reason you haven’t looked yet, results are here.

Quitters! We’ve all heard that quitters never win, but at CIM, it turns out that winners are quitters.

Whiners! Not only are the elites big quitters, they are big whiners too, apparently. In his lengthy blog post, Justin Young (5th in 2:14:07) recounts all the Job-like tribulations an elite runner such as himself must encounter when deigning to run our little race. Then, naturally, he gets thrashed for his post by anonymous cowards on Letsrun.

Olympic Trials Bound? Thirteen women and two men earned a spot in the US Olympic Marathon trials for 2012.

Pictures! Sacramento Press has a photo essay and the Bee has some snapshots from the race. Sadly, unlike from the Run to Feed the Hungry, there are no shirtless pictures of Eric Johnson. Sport Photo, the official race photographers (You know: the ones who will be hounding you for the next year to purchase that photo of you grimacing at the 20-mile point.) have photos for purchase here.

People Making Life Changes of Epic Proportions! I had the pleasure of working at the Buffalo Chips booth at the CIM Expo, where we weighed in the Athena and Clydesdale runners. (These are men over 200 and women over 150 pounds.) One gentleman, still 200-plus, was eager to tell us he’d lost a 100 pounds over the last year. He had an infectious enthusiasm and seemed incredibly happy to be there. His name is Travis Colby and you can read about him in the Merced Sun Star. It turns out he grew up in Citrus Heights, so maybe you know him. He ended up running a respectable 4:38:35. And, of course, he has a blog.

People Not Paying Attention! Last but not least, here’s that video clip everyone’s been talking about. You have to give credit to the guy Channel 31’s Neda Iranpour interviews for being such a good sport in an awkward moment.