Bachman Valley Half Marathon, 26 September 2004
~132 runners registered; 121 finishers

Gilmore, DeWald Conquer Bachman Valley Course

What happens when one guy decides to use this race as the beginning part of a 22 mile workout and another guy runs a cross-country 8K pr on Saturday and then spends 6 hours in a bus getting back to Westminster?

The answer is that they blow away the field and run some of the fastest times on the course.

Mark Gilmore, a graduate of Westminster High School in the mid-1980's and now a resident of Columbia , won the Main Street Mile in April, and to show his versatility did the same thing for the half-marathon.

Running and talking with Paul Hugus for the first eleven miles, the happy twosome passed the one mile mark in 5:30, with Jason Grimm, Justin Gassman, and Kent Werner trailing by 10-20 seconds. By the time they reached five miles in 29:00, only Grimm, a D-III runner who went to school in Wisconsin and who is now a member of a track club at the University of Maryland, was within a minute of the two leaders.

As the race moved into the second lap, Gilmore and Hugus picked up the pace, running the second five miles faster than the first. The net result of that effort was that the ten mile split reader didn't make it from the five mile mark in time. At eleven miles the leaders did, however, get a split time of 63:30, at which point Gilmore bid Hugus a fond farewell and pushed into another gear.

With runners still coming by the water stop in front of the starting line at the end of the first loop of the course, Gilmore charged to the finish line in 1:15:37, the second fastest time on this version of the course, begun in 2000, and one of the top five times in the twenty-two year history of the race. Hugus followed ninety seconds later, with the third fastest time on the course. Grimm arrived in another ninety seconds, with Gassman and Werner following at two minute intervals.

Bill Peeling, who has come from Delaware numerous times and who has two top five finishes in previous years, finished sixth as the first masters runner. Club member Doug Preston finished 18th as the first senior runner, and Skip Fennell, who has been putting his sabbatical leave to good use, finished 64th as the first 60 and over runner.

DeWald, who is so famous in running circles that Gilmore introduced himself to her after the race, cruised through the first mile in 6:10, nearly a minute ahead of club member and 2001 winner Tina McCubbin, with last year's second place finisher, Lisa Warren, close behind.

At the five mile mark, DeWald--whose 2:34 marathon best ranked her as one of America's best female marathoners of the 1980's and who has competed internationally as a member of the national team on several occasions--was in the top fifteen of the one hundred twenty-five member field with a time of 35:20. McCubbin was trailing by a minute, with Warren another two minutes behind.

At the finish DeWald's margin of victory was ninety seconds, good for twelfth place overall, while McCubbin finished fifteenth overall. Warren finished another two a one-half minutes behind.

One of the more interesting stories was the performance of North Carroll junior Amy Watson. The youngest runner in the field, she ran in the top five of the women's division during the whole race and finished with the best time ever by a female high school runner. Four time winner Jenny Caple, now actively involved in triathlon competition, finished her work at the registration table to move through the pack to finish fifth.

With both DeWald and Warren competing as masters runners, the younger folk were taught a good lesson. Pamela Gooding finished 11th as the first senior runner. Beth Weisenborn, one of several seen heavy with child at the race, vows to reappear next year to represent the club's efforts.

Photos from the race start.