Monday, March 27, 2000
MINI-MARATHON NOTEBOOK
Taylor kept close eye on competition
BY MICHAEL PERRY
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Kevin Taylor shared a room at the Westin Hotel with Tim Menoher on Saturday night.
Roughly 11,500 runners and walkers participated Sunday.
(Gary Landers photo)
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The two Northern Kentucky residents run together about once a week and suspected they were in close confines with their toughest competition for Sunday's 15-kilometer ChoiceCare/Humana Cincinnati Heart Mini-Marathon.
“I was trying to feed him M&Ms before the race,” Taylor said, smiling. “I knew he was going to be trouble.”
Menoher ended up winning, beating Taylor by 67 seconds. On the final uphill approach on Columbia Parkway, Taylor tried to make a move but couldn't gain much ground.
“I thought, "I've got to give at least one shot to pull even.' I felt tired,” Taylor said. “When I made that kick, the wind picked up.”
Taylor, 24, is just getting back into racing. He trained hard for three or four months but didn't run in an event until the Xenia Half-Marathon three weeks ago.
He is a marathoner who used Sunday's event for training. He plans to run in the Flying Pig Marathon in May.
Taylor grew up in Pittsburgh. He moved to the area last August and lives in Independence, Ky.
“It was a great race,” he said. “The running community here is real strong.”
PUSHING IT: Annette Bauer hadn't planned on being one of the front-runners in the women's division. She hadn't run the Heart Mini-Marathon in 12 years and had run 15 kilometers on Saturday while preparing for her first Boston Marathon (to be held April17).
“I went out kind of easy, and I just started passing people,” she said.
Bauer, 36, saw Jill Tranter way ahead and didn't even think about trying to catch her.
“I saw her at the turnaround,” Bauer said. “She went out pretty hard at the beginning. They said she was about 30 seconds ahead of me. I didn't try to get her. I was tired from (Saturday). I was mostly trying to have fun. This was good practice (for Boston).”
Bauer lives in New Carlisle, Ohio, northeast of Dayton. Her sister Marie, who lives in Cincinnati, talked her into coming down for the race.
Bauer moved to Ohio in September after spending a year as a dentist on an Apache Indian Reservation in New Mexico.
RED CAP DIVISION: Barry Levine was coming down Columbia Parkway after the turnaround and saw Steve Hoffman, who finished first in the Red Cap division last year.
“When I saw him coming up, I knew I had a chance,” said Levine, 52, who underwent quadruple bypass surgery in July 1994.
He went on to win in 1:07:17, his first first-place finish.
“After halfway, I felt pretty good,” Levine said. “You never know. It's a fast race. It was a little warm. I thought I might stiffen up a little coming down that last hill.”
Hoffman finished third. Second place went to Greg Cannon.
The Red Cap division is for heart disease and stroke survivors.
Cannon ran the Mini-Marathon for the second straight year and thinks he may have an advantage.
He is only 32 years old — at least a decade or two younger than most of his Red Cap competitors. He had open-heart surgery at age 11 to close a hole in his heart that was the result of a birth defect. When the hole became infected, an operation was necessary. He hasn't had any problems since.
“I talked to the people who run this,” Cannon said. “I felt kind of funny last year running in this division. It might be a good idea to have a blue cap division for congenital heart disease. It's probably a little unfair.”
RUN FACTS: Barrett Hopper of Fairfield won the 5K run, and Carrie Crofford of Cleves won the women's 5K. Rex Boutelle of Cincinnati won the 5K Red Cap division, and Sherry Hoy of Fairfield won that distance in the Red Cap women's competition. Susie Mueller of Oxford won the 15K women's Red Cap division. ... Among the music playing along the course Sunday: the Star Wars theme, Chariots of Fire, YMCA. ... The early leader in the 15K was George Willoughby, who sprinted in front of the pack for the first few blocks.
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