Picture by Nick Henthorn
69 racers completed the 13-mile-long Ogden Wellness Weekend Half Marathon Stroll on Saturday, Lee Stough coming in first whereas Heidi Ferns was the ladies’s champion.
WHEELING – After ending because the runner-up in final 12 months’s Ogden Half Marathon Traditional Stroll, Lee Stough leapfrogged to the highest spot on this 12 months’s go-round. The Glassport, Pennsylvania, native credited a bit extra motivation coming into this 12 months’s race.
“Final 12 months’s announcer was one of many greatest causes I did so significantly better this 12 months,” Stough mentioned. “When he introduced the winner final 12 months, I heard him say ‘No shock right here.’ I mentioned, properly, I’m going to shock him subsequent 12 months and for the subsequent 10 years after that. I used to be extremely motivated this 12 months to win the title, I feel it’s my fourth time successful right here. I actually intend to maintain doing this race for a lot of many years to come back.”
Stough walked the 13.1-mile Wheeling roundabout in 2:07:12, 12 minutes forward of second-place Carl Kondrach from Barnesville, Ohio, who was runner-up with a 2:19:18 end.
The course, which reaches elevations as excessive as 1,200 ft throughout its span, was as robust because it was rewarding for Stough.
“Fairly overwhelmed down,” he mentioned. “I felt okay the entire method by, however with the climate being a lot hotter this 12 months than final 12 months, about 25 levels hotter, plus the solar beating on me, it did take so much out of me over the past two-and-a-half miles or so. Happily I had constructed sufficient of a result in make that not find yourself hurting me. I’m higher conditioned this 12 months than I used to be final 12 months.”
“It’s all the time a troublesome one, one of many hardest programs I’ve ever raced on, but when you understand how to deal with the hills and know how you can psychologically keep within the race, you are able to do simply effective. However you do must be well-trained.”
Stough has been partaking within the half marathon since 2010. It’s a favourite of his, as is an annual half-marathon in Parkersburg, two robust races that deliver him out to West Virginia annually.
“I assume I torture myself with the 2 hardest programs,” Stough mentioned. “However I really like West Virginia, I really like the folks, I really like the entire ambiance right here. I really like taking little holidays annually for this race and the Parkersburg race. I’ll make a weekend out of it for every race.”
Wheeling native Nate Schneider completed third whereas Blacklick, Ohio’s James Lapinski completed fourth.
The fifth to cross the end line was the lady’s champion and one other Wheeling native, Heidi Ferns.
Ferns completed in 2:40:52, an effort which she chalked as much as higher well being.
“I’ve to thank my brother-in-law whose useful medication received my hormones again in examine, I’ve a wholesome, useful life once more and he received me again to doing issues like this.”
After deciding to place it on the again burner whereas she was elevating her kids, Ferns is again to competing in races alongside her longtime buddy Kathy Ervin, who completed twelfth total, and seventh amongst girls racers.
“We used to do that so much, after which after all my youngsters received into sports activities, my youngsters have been my world, and every thing else type of stopped. Now it’s my time and I’m again at it.”
A aggressive swimmer rising up, Ferns loved the challenges of the course.
“I really like this course, I really like hills. For me, as a result of I hadn’t skilled that far, that final hill was the toughest.”
Wheeling native Brenda Colvin was the second-place finisher amongst girls with a time of two:41:02.
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