Weekend Race Round Up: Bloomsday, Tacoma City Marathon, Vancouver International Marathon, Cinco De Mayo Half Marathon

Cinco De Mayo Half Marathon(Snoqualmie) 5/5-Jesse Williams and Megan Heuer took the top honors in the men’s and women’s half marathon on Saturday with times of 1:10:17 and 1:20:24. To show the increasing depth of the masters division in Seattle area races, 6 masters runners finished in the top 11 places and all broke 1:20. The masters pack was led by Jeff Hashimoto(1:12:47), Chris Fendrich(1:13:21) and David McCulloch(1:14:38).

Tacoma City Marathon(Tacoma) 5/6- There were several impressive performances at this year’s race, but leading the way was Mike Lynes in winning his 6^th TCM title in as many years with a time of 2:44:54 and Allison Linnell who won the women’s race in a very fast 2:48:04. Linnell, who was a strong performer for the University of Washington Women’s Cross Country team was third overall in the marathon on Sunday as she only a few minutes behind Lynes and Andy Henshaw who both ran the same time. Rounding out the Top 3 on the men’s side was Eric John in 2:54:29. In the women’s race Sabine Pullins was 2^nd in 3:14:25 and last year’s champion Merita Trohimovish was 3^rd in 3:18:09.

Vancouver International Marathon(Vancouver, BC) 5/6-With very few top-notch Americans making the trip across the border to the Vancouver International Marathon it was nice to see a few speedy Washingtonians place in the Top 25 in both the Marathon and Half Marathon on Sunday. Charlie Sunderlage of Bellingham led the charge in the Half Marathon with an 8^th place finish in a time of 1:09:48. Shelly Hack of Redmond and Alycia Hill of Bellevue finished 8^th and 9^th in the women’s race with times of 1:24:12 and 1:24:34. In the marathon Christopher Mah cracked the Top 10 with a 9^th place finish in 2:38:06. Mah, who lives in Seattle, ran impressive splits of 1:19:57 and 1:18:10 for his marathon.

Bloomsday(Spokane) 5/6- Among the 47,882 finishers, who came from every state in the union and almost every corner of the globe, there were 6 Washingtonians that stood out in sea of runners that took part in the 36^th running of the Lilac Bloomsday 12k Run. Mike Sayenko was 11^th in extremely competitive elite field with a time of 35:45. Claudia Copeland matched Sayenko’s 11^th place finish in the women’s race which was equally as competitive in a time 42:13. Other top finishers were Aissa Dghoughi(36:14) from Vancouver in 18^th and Uli Steidl who just missed the masters title by 1 second in a time of 37:10 which was good enough for 25^th place overall. Mattie Suver(Lake Tapps) was just behind Copeland in the women’s race in 12^th place at 42:38 and Janet Collar of Spokane was also in the Top 25 with a 22^rd place finish in 45:05.