Out-of-Towners Rule Chicago Half Marathon

Nathan Krah, 24, of Boston, and Andrea Pomaranski, 28, of Farmington Hills, MI (Hansons team) enjoyed their runs on the southern Chicago lakefront on Sunday, collecting victories in the 14th annual Chicago Half Marathon. It was a sun-drenched day with temps in the 60s and very little wind as 13,546 (at least for now) runners finished this 13.1-miler that starts and finishes near Jackson Park. When I saw the men's and women's leaders coming south as I was heading north, Krah and Pomaranski seemed to have control of the race. Krah won it in 1:07:11, with David Jankowski, 25, of Blowing Rock, NC, second in 1:07:48. This just in. Dale Bowman of the Chicago Sun-Times had a nice story on the race in Monday's edition and reported that Jankowski had the lead early but had to make a pottie stop. Meanwhile, first local finisher and third overall was Emisael Favela, 33, of Cicero, who came in at 1:08:16. Not too shabby, Emisael! Fourth went to Chad Ware, 25, of Deerfield, close to Favela at 1:08:21, and fifth was taken by Eric Waller, 27, of Chicago, in 1:10:31. Pomaranski owned the women's race, winning in 1:13:15. This one was settled early. Runner-up was Renee High, 28, of Virginia Beach, VBA, in 1:17:48. Third and first local was Erin Moffett, 28, of Chicago, in 1:19:06, with fourth going to Andrea Viger, 32, of Boulder, CO, in 1:19:50, and fifth went to local favorite Jean Marinangeli, 26, of Arlington Heights, in 1:20:13. Personally, I played it a bit conservatively early and tried to push it late. That course is beautiful, and my temperamental feet survived the concrete on Lake Shore Drive just fine. Here's a special shout to Team Fast Track's David Schaefers, who gave my a nice handshake about a quarter-mile into the race as he led the 1:30 pace group. Thanks, Dave! And it was very much fun seeing and running near a lot of my teammates from the Fossil Velocity team that does the Madison-Chicago Relay each June as well as the Elmhurst Running Club. Hope your races went well.