No matter where your loyalties lie with regard to your baseball team of choice, you have to be grateful for Dodger owner Frank McCourt's support of the Los Angeles Marathon. In its previous 24 incarnations, the Los Angeles Marathon covered many different routes, but nary one over ground that inspired anyone to participate in it. This year was a different story. By plotting out a stadium-to-sea course, McCourt and his organization gave thousands of runners renewed motivation to slog through 26.2 miles. Although the new route has a net elevation drop of several hundred feet, it is not necessarily an easy course thanks to many different grade changes. Still, the energy on the course was a world apart from prior years, and in a good way. Moreover, it seemed as if the gods decided to reward all with weather fit for marathoners and spectators alike. In the end, the course, the crowds, and the weather spurred on many in Track Club L.A., and the performances were generally strong.
Mike Davies's top-25 finish (in a field of 22,299) led the way for TCLA and made the whole club proud. For better or worse for those trying to emulate him, he made it look easy. Bert Whitson and Su-Yang Liu, also sub-3:00 finishers, also managed to look like they were on training runs over the closing miles. Following splits provided to him by Jim Gidlow, Bruce Reisenfeld held 3:00 pace until he suffered the common five-minute creep in the last six miles. Nevertheless, Bruce earned himself a big p.r. Frank Tai turned in another steady performance and seemed ready for more at the finish. At the start, Frank showed the wisdom of his years by lining up just behind Wesley Korir and scoring some nice air time for his mug and the TCLA crest. Hoping to be ahead of Frank, Mike Mahurin and Nyron Bernard ended up five minutes behind him thanks to hamstring cramps and general fatigue.
TCLA's lead women had a nice cluster with the first five finishing between 3:15 and 3:20, Susanne McNeil Eng looking the strongest among them. Perhaps having her kids waiting for her at the finish line served as the proper inspiration (no one wants to scare their kids off the marathon experience by having them watch mom being carted off by medical personnel). David Kent also finished relatively fresh and, more significantly, cramp-free in the calf. He also had family on the course, though his kids were at the 22-mile-mark where they asked him as he ran by, “Aren't you done now?" Efrain Velasco had no children cheering him on, but he still came within a minute of hitting his goal time. Chatting with him, David, and a guy wearing a TCLA hat in the finish area, Courtney Carter seemed pleased with her race.
Mike Monaghan was next to cross the line for TCLA, and he really deserved two medals at that point because he ran the race in Vibram Five Fingers. Opting for more conventional footwear, Rikako Takei and Jeff Brettler both broke 3:30 and were happy for it. David Schwartz has had better marathons, but he was not too spent at the end of this one. Philip Steinman was all smiles at the finish line, and he stuck around there to greet others coming in. Enduring a difficult second half, Peter Glassman held on as best he could. Deb Liu crossed the finish line with a great time and a glazed look that would have got her carried off to the drug testing tent had there been one. Blair Tarr wished that he had had some of whatever Deb was taking, but he moved on well at the finish exclaiming, “That's done. When does cross country season start?" Mark Harris was hoping for a slightly better time, but he held on well and should be proud of his race. For Dean Goodman, it was a game-time decision as to whether he would run with his bad back, and a handful of ibuprofen turned the light green. Kim Brettler is one of the few people who can consider the marathon a short race, though she was glad to be done with it. Marissa Tiamfook had to climb the proverbial wall, but she got over it and finished well enough.
Taking advantage of the oceanside finish, Stephanie Pogorelsky walked in the Pacific for three miles after her race. Masami Fukuhara was last seen in the finish chute; no word whether she went strolling in the ocean, too. Kitty Lim, recent recipient of the club's Beginner of the Year award, proved she earned it by running a 12-minute p.r. Other sub-4:00 finishers include Phil Kent, Anne-Marie Mowad, Carl Finer, Kwesi Asamoah, and Bram Weinkselbaum.
Just over the 4:00 mark, Michael Berger ran a well-paced race. Sharon Yamato took eight salt tablets during the race and still managed to end up in the medical tent at the finish. Once there, she recovered quickly. Jeannie Choi-Wolff was happy to check out the new course. On 4:00 pace at the half, Nicole Radford had some trouble getting over that pesky wall. After a mid-race pit stop for an Egg McMuffin at mile eight, Jacinda Raiche and Mike Sudo covered the remaining miles with plenty of calories in the tank. Jennifer Liu was one of the few to manage negative splits. Hoss Dubash ran half the race with a mild concussion (don't try that one at home, kids), and Ellen Kukuchka, and Scott Allen wrapped things up for the club.
As always, the club had more than runners on the course. Several TCLA'ers put their running to good use and served as tow trucks, including Steph Cahn, Wenise Wong, Rasmus Tamstorf, Tim Petersen, Brian Panosian, Rab Brown, Robert Newmark, Jimmy Freeman, Laura Landgreen, Rory Khoo, Jenny Takakura, Alex Thompson, Clarence Smith, Ann Duarte, and Elaine Woodward. Supporting the runners in a more stationary fashion were Brian Bartholomew, Amy Aukstikalnis, Susan Rendell, Monica Hirschberger, Wayne Joness, Lauren Weinstein, Theresa Uhrig, Lawrence Spear, Ron Hecker, Rith Tun, and Peter Abraham (okay, so Peter was not so stationary; he was in the pace car). And manning the TCLA tent just before the 22-mile mark were Jim Gidlow, Chris DeWitt, Violet Barron, Liz Grau, Elizabeth Farnan, Gerry Rodrigues, Eric Bowles, Kate Bowles, Danny Demsky, Yeong Loh, and Gary McArdle.
Average Finishing Time: 3:44:41.6
Average Per Mile Pace: 8:34.2
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