High Desert Dirt: Corrida de los Locos

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Corrida de los Locos - Race Report

A speedy crew at the start - Peters, Juniper, Espo, Abebe, Luis, Juan, Jake

This weekend's 26th annual Corrida de los Locos lived up to its name. In an inversion of annual norms, we had crazy-warm fall weather rather than snow and bitter cold. Don't know if it was the great weather or some other unseen fortune that brought out twice the regular field of runners - more than four times the number from last year.

This year's Corrida wound through the rolling golf course at Marty Sanchez before heading out and along a path paralleling Caja del Rio Rd. At the turn-around runners retraced their route to the finish. In prior years there was hardpack and ice to deal with, particularly black ice in the tree shadows of the golf greens and frustrating stretches of ankle deep post-holing on the Caja del Rio section. All of this make for a fantastic cross country race but were elements that this year's racers did not have to deal with. They did have to deal with burritos from the Santa Fe Baking Company and coffee provided by Java Joe's. More of an advantage than a deterrent actually but I digress.

A pack of runners at the mile plus mark

Another pack unfazed by the beautiful weather

Along with a record turnout this year's field was fairly stacked. Eventual champion Abebe Yimmer (former Las Vegas Marathon champion) and runner-up Luis Chavez pulled away from the returning champ Mike Ehrmantraut early in the 5.5ish mile race, and ran in tandem to the finish line. In the women's race, newcomer and this year's Santa Fe Snow Shoe Classic champ Whitney Dreier built an insurmountable lead over the rest of the field including past champions Newlyn Allison and Gina Ortiz, finishing clear of runner-up Erin Sindewald by a few hundred meters. We also had a fair turnout of prep runners this year with Daniel Romero of Los Alamos running to the front in a finishing time of 32:23, good for fifth overall in a very good field. Podium results were as follows:

Men's Overall: 1) Abebe Yimmer, 29:33; 2) Luis Chavez, 29:33; 3) Mike Ehrmantraut, 31:25. Women's Overall: 1) Whitney Dreier, 37:41; 2) Erin Sindewald, 39:25; 3) Shiela Van Cuyk 41:06

Full and age-group results can be find at the Striders' website here.
Prior year results can be found here.
A photo album of the race can be found here.

Marc Esposito crosses the line in fourth

Eric Peters closes in sixth

Notables (and training buddies of mine) that finished up front include Highlands University runner and former Big Tesuque champ Luis Chavez; returning Corrida champ and the 2010 Big Tesuque champ Mike Ehrmantraut; former Big Tesuque champ and recent NYC marathoner Marc Esposito (4th), 31:42; All-around speed demon and former Duke City Marathon champ Eric Peters (6th), 32:25; Mt Taylor Quadrathlon front-packer Juniper Hunter (7th), 32:50; Marathoner Matt Dreier (8th), 33:07; Ultra runner (and blogger) Jacob Waltz, 35:04; Boston Marathoners Mike Dobesh 35:37, and Tony Gallegos 35:51; Corrida race director Meredith Schoenfeld crossed in 42:21; trail-runner and marathoner Gina Ortiz, 42:23; and Los Alamos trail runner Tracy Kneisler in 45:38.

A special thanks goes out to race directors Therese Trujillo and Meredith Schoenfeld and their crew of volunteers; to Mike Walsh at Paseo Pottery who provided the overall and age-group awards, and SF Screen Printers who did the printing on the race shirts we ran out of; to Whole Foods and Java Joe's for providing food and coffee. And lastly to the 106 runners that showed up to run on a beautiful January morning. Very well done to all involved and all who raced.