KIMbia Athletics

Turning in an impressive, historic performance in just her second-ever marathon, Shalane Flanagan punched her ticket for the London Games by winning the US Olympic Trials. Her time of 2:25:38 slashed just over three minutes from her previous personal best, set a Trials record, and is the 6th-fastest performance by an American woman, all-time. And as the #3 US performer ever, she now trails only Deena Drossin-Kastor and Joan Benoit-Samuelsson — each of whom won an Olympic medal at the distance.

After biding her time for the first two hours of running, Flanagan made a late break and won by seventeen seconds over Boston Marathon runner-up Desiree Davila; new teammate Kara Goucher became Shalane’s Olympic teammate, as well, thanks to her third-place finish. “I tried to view it as a track race for the last mile,” Flanagan said after the race. “I didn’t really enjoy that last mile. It felt really long.” Read the full article

Chris Solinsky showed best among KIMbia athletes ranked by Track and Field News at the end of 2010, ending the year ranked 8th overall among all American men, and 3rd in the world for 10000m. While Solinsky’s American Record 26:59 at Stanford was the world’s second-fastest time of the year for 10000m, Wilson Kiprop got the top slot in the world rankings by virtue of his wins at the Kenyan National Championships and African Champs. Additionally, Kiprop won the World Championship in the Half Marathon this Fall: clearly a phenomenal athlete having a phenomenal season, and we are certainly very, very proud of Chris and this, his first Top-10 appearance in the T&FN World Rankings. Solinsky actually ranked 1st in the world in the event — and 5th in the 5000m — according to the IAAF’s point-system, which rates marks and head-to-head competition, with an eye toward repeated good performances. And, moreover, the Stevens Point-native ended 2010 ranked #76 in the world across all disciplines, according to the IAAF system. Not too shabby in a sport where over 6,000 male competitors earned points in professional competition. Read the full article

In Nanning, China, Sean Quigley continued to establish himself as one of the top American long-distance road runners, placing 19th at the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships on Saturday.  On an America contingent that incldued former US Road Champions Antonio Vega and Andrew Carlson, as well as Ben Bruce and Stephan Shay, Quigley was the first American across the line, leading the team to a 6th-place finish.  It was Quigley’s debut in the National Team uniform and at the Half Marathon distance. His finish time was 63:23, on a warm and humid day.

Full results are here.

Sean Quigley can’t be anything but proud after taking home his first US Championship in any discipline, winning the Stratton Faxon New Haven 20k on Labor Day, with a time of 59:21.  Calling his post-collegiate career a “disappointment” to date, Quigley stepped up to take down US road champions Mo Trafeh, Brett Gotcher, and KIMbia’s James Carney, making New Haven the impressive win that the Massachusetts native had long been seeking.

Gotcher entered the race as the defending champion, Trafeh the returning runner-up, and Carney the 2008 champion. Late in the race,  Trafeh, Carney, and Quigley had broken away, and after weathering a surge by Trafeh, each KIMbia man made a bid for the win.  Carney went first, opening a gap during the long final straightaway, with Quigley just behind.  With a half-mile to go, it was Quigley’s move that came last and propelled him to first place: a victory in the longest race he had ever contested. Carney finished third, just four seconds behind Trafeh, while Jason Hartmann placed 8th in 60:44.

Full coverage can be found here.

KIMbia athletes did the memory of Kim McDonald proud on Saturday night, as Chris Solinsky and Simon Bairu smashed the American and Canadian national records, respectively, in the 10,000m race that bears McDonald’s name.

Last year, Tim Nelson won this race in a strong 27:39. In 2010, seven KIMbia athletes toed the starting line for the Kim McDonald 10,000m at Stanford’s Payton Jordan Invitational, and this time, the results were outright astounding.  Chris Solinsky ran steadily in the lead pack for the duration of the race, before stepping around race leader Galen Rupp and making an explosive move with 900 meters to go. Solinsky covered the final two laps in under 2:00 to shock running fans the world over and stop the clock at 26:59.60 — a new American record by an eye-popping fourteen seconds.  Moments later, teammate Simon Bairu would complete his own impressive run, logging a 27:23.63 to set a new Canadian national record. Bairu’s time peeled 12.38 seconds off of the previous record.

Oh, and Tim Nelson? He ran 27:31.56 — an terrific eight-second PB. But this year, on an historic night, it would “only” place him seventh. Clearly, the legacy of Kim McDonald lives on in the performances of the athletes running under the “KIMbia” banner and in the ever-improving performances of athletes around the world. Following Nelson in were Brent Vaughn, making his professional debut at this distance (13th, 28:05), Boaz Cheboiywo (14th, 28:06), and Jason Hartmann (19th, 28:25). Full results can be found here, and a video of the race is at the bottom of the page.

We will have much more on Solinsky and Bairu’s record-breaking races as we move into the week.