January 13, 2007
Little River Trail Run
Race Director's Report

The Second Annual Little River Trail Run awoke to sunny skies and temperatures pushing the 70s. A beautiful day in May. But it was January!? We'll take it. 50 volunteers, 400 runners, and an incredible Little River park staff were coming together for a celebration!

At 9:15, with a wail of the bullhorn, the 9 miler started with runners passing by Squonk's music kiosk, blaring a combination of Celtic romps, The Who, and Frank Sinatra. How do you settle on a pace with that combo? Runners hooted, hollered, and hoofed it onto the beautiful trails at Little River.

The front runners of the 9 mile race winnowed down to three, Brent Ferrell, Geoff King, and Jonathon Williams. Based on the 59:30 course record, we expected (and planned!) for the winners to emerge from the woods at around that time. Wrong. Brent dashed out of the woods and finished in 56:21, shattering the course record. Geoff came in only 21 seconds after Brent, also shattering the old course record. Not to be left out, Jonathon finishing third in 58:57. Amazing.

Equally amazing were the top three women, Caroline Blatti, Sarah Hallenbeck, and Allison Peters. The women's course record was 1:07:35. After the men's results, all bets were off as to how quickly the first woman would come out of the woods. I heard someone yell, "there she is!" It was Caroline, making the loop around the field and breaking the course record by 15 seconds, finishing in a blistering 1:07:20. Sarah was just a minute behind her at 1:08:22, with Allison finishing third in 1:11 flat. A fast day, indeed.

Admittedly, the 5K is a little long. We warned you! How long? Dunno. If we knew, we wouldn't tell you. It's a mystery. We don't measure the downhill and we don't charge you for the extra mileage! The 85+ runners in the 5K started at 10:05, sort of. The start was a little jumpy. I mistakenly hit the bullhorn and yelled STOP. Then someone told me to hold it. Then Gilly said, GO!, followed by more bullhorn (or was that cowbell?).

15-year old Taylor Gilland ripped the first mile and was out of sight, finishing in a blazing 21:26 and besting the course record (his) by more than 2 minutes. Another 15-year old, Nicholas Ludlow, finished second in 23:19. Combined, Taylor's and Nicholas's ages were younger than the third place runner, 32-year old Louis Pelsang, who finished in a brisk 23:54. Congrats to Louis for staying on the heels of these young speedsters!

In the women's 5K, Chris Tommerdahl from Chapel Hill took top honors in a time of 27:13, about 50 seconds ahead of the real battle in the 5K. I was fortunate enough to be standing at the spot that separated 2nd and 3rd in the women's 5K. Molly Grabow snuck past Mackenzie Robinson in the last 20 meters to win second place by 1 second! Congratulations to Chris, Molly, and Mackenzie on fantastic races.

While we respect and appreciate the top runners, our hats go off to the 300 plus other runners who gutted their way through the trails and landscape (hills) of Little River. We are so lucky to have this resource in the triangle and we are just as lucky to have you all with us to celebrate it. Some of you are gnarly trail veterans; others are first time trail runners; and many of you set new personal bests for time or distance covered. This race is for everyone, and everyone finished with a varying array of smiles and grimaces, with sweat and sometimes blood (Right, Donald?) streaming down their faces!

The backcountry rangers in the national park system have a motto that they "get paid in sunsets." The TrailHeads get paid in smiles, gutsy finishes, and great stories. My favorite story of the day is from the woman who finished the 9 miler in 2 hours! After falling at 6 miles, she reportedly stood up and said "I've never run this far before!" Hah! That's it! That's what we're after! She finished to rousing applause from the crowd. Afterward, she asked if she could have the Little River sign as a memento. Of course! And, as soon as we can get it to her, she'll receive a LRTR mug in the mail as the first winner of the "I'm gonna kick this race's butt" Award winner. That's the Little River Trail Run. Thank you!

We encourage you to submit your race report or favorite story by either posting it here online or submitting it to the race director at jwstrange22[at]yahoo.com.

Thank you for celebrating with us!

PS: This fun would not be possible without the constant help of Little River park staff and officials and the incredible volunteers and sponsors. Many many thanks! (big group hug!)