To clarify - this was Seth Pilkington, not Wold. Seth Wold ran in St. George and got third place with 2:25:48. Seth Pilkington went through the half in 1:06, and was still around at 25 K, but I do not see him at 30 K, so I assume a DNF.
Two particularly impressive performances by Utah runners. Alexander Tomas (or I suppose since he is Serbian and they used the Latin alphabet we should use the original spelling of his first name - Aleksandar) - 2:18:58. So that shows that if you can run in the 1:06 range in TOU half and/or SLC half you have a shot at an OTQ. But he does not get to go unless he becomes a US citizens. Not easy unless you are married to an American, but he has a remote shot of making it as an outstanding athlete. But he might not want to pursue that path since he might be able to run for Serbia in the Olympics.
Albert Wint - 2:29:58. This is a 10 minute PR (old PR set in Salt Lake this year). What is particularly impressive about it is that he is missing a flap in a heart valve. Goes to show that sub-2:30 can be done even if you have a congenial heart defect.
Another noteworthy performance is Nate Hornok's 2:27:30 which is a serious PR. I believe by 14 minutes (old PR in Park City 2008) if I remember right. Nate is a Lost Sheep. His blog is at
http://nathan.fastrunningblog.com/. His brother Jesse blogs actively and his blog is at
http://jhorn.fastrunningblog.com/Jeff and I both thought Wanjiru would blow up. We were obviously wrong. Goes to show that a bad half untapered in the middle of marathon training is often an indicator of a good marathon coming up. Of course, not always. Same to some extent for Deena. After her 1:13 half in New York I thought she would have a hard time breaking 2:33. But she managed 2:28 in spite of visiting the bathroom mid-race.
