The San Juan Solstice 50 Mile Run

Divide & Conquer

San Juan Solstice 50

2012 Results

 

Race Report

Male Winners


1 Jason Schlarb    Boulder, Colorado     8:13:00

2 Jesse Rickert    Gunnison, Colorado    9:16:49

3 Brendan Trimboli Durango, Colorado     9:21:18


Female Winners


1 Bethany Lewis    Salt Lake City, Utah  9:58:15

2 Leila DeGrave    Evergreen, Colorado  10:42:05

3 Sarah Evans      Alta, Utah           10:52:40



Jason Schlarb ties Dakota Jones’ challenge to Matt Carpenter's sub-eight-hour record at the San Juan Solstice 50 Mile Run. Iraq war vet Schlarb was prevented from running in the 2011 SJS50 due to deployment in May of that year. But he was back this year and came within 14 minutes of Carpenter's 7:59:45 record, set in 2004.  Carpenter's "freak of nature" performance had been expected to stand indefinitely, but now it appears that there is may be a showdown coming soon.


The female record was even more in jeopardy, with First Place Bethany Lewis finishing in a time of 9:58:15, less than 6 minutes away from Anthea Schmid’s 2002 record of 9:52:46. Second Place male was Jesse Rickert at 9:16:49 and Third Place male was Brendan Trimboli at 9:21:18. Leila DeGrave was Second Place female at 10:47:17 and Sarah Evans was Third Place female at 10:52:40.


This year's course followed the classic route, since dangerous creek crossings and major snowfields on the continental Continental Divide were not an the issue as they were last year. With 198 starters, this was the closest the SJS50 has ever come to starting a full field of runners. 144 finished the race and there were no major problems. The weather was hot and dry. Shortly after noon, smoke blowing into the area from the Mancos wildfire brought an eerie orange cast to the sunlight and it became quite thick for a few hours. Several runners commented on how the strange light was depressing and de-motivating.  Thankfully, it slowly cleared out as the afternoon progressed. We had several complaints of congestion from the smoke and a nosebleed or two, but it did not seem to be a big problem for most runners.


A big hit at the awards ceremony this year was artist Russ Brown's 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place men's and women's overall awards. Russ chose several spectacular views from the course, rendered them in his artistic style, and roughed in male and female runners. After those finishers came in, they were sent over to The Russ Brown Gallery next to the Finish Line, where Russ took note of details for each runner, like hair color and style, hat or visor, and color of tops and shorts or running skirt, and then painted them into their award along with their name, their place, and their finishing time. See some of these awesome masterpieces displayed on the awards page.




                     Complete list of 2012 finishers.