Zoomin' Zak Plunge and Plod Biathlon!

Last weekend racers gathered at the pier for Peaman's Zoomin' Zak Plunge and Plod Biathlon.  Thanks to John Simmerman who helped out with the timing, I was actually able to race a Peaman event for the first time in about six months.  Of course, that means we still aren't able to take pictures of the races.  The one token picture in this post is from last year's event, but you can imagine it looked very similar.

The distances for this race were a half mile swim and a 3.9 mile run.  The water was pretty calm and there was a good sized crowd for the race. Full results from the race are available here.

In the overall race, Tommy Vonach came in first in 37:51, followed by Don Baldasari in 41:25 and Chris Prater in 41:54.  For the ladies, it was Hannah Seifert taking first place in 47:17; Cobey Ackerman was second in 48:15; and Marissa Bryant-Manago was third in 49:34. I squeaked out fourth in 50:12.

On the way out, I had a great swim, reaching the turnaround about 1 minute faster than usual.  Of course, I gave almost all of that back by swimming way crooked on the way back in, finishing about 10 seconds faster than usual.

After transition, it was out onto the run course.  After running with Chitwin for the first mile, I spotted my targets ahead - Bree Wee and Mike Masuda.  Bree had raced the swim portion and then waited for Mike to come out of the water and ran with him. I kept reeling them in until right before the turnaround when I made my move.  After passing them, I knew I had to keep pushing until the very end, otherwise they were very likely to pass me again! One of the benefits (or downsides) of a small race like this is that you know everyone coming in the other direction so they all give you a cheer or encouragement.  Of course, they also all know Bree and Mike, so I could count the time between cheers for me and cheers for them and know how close they were staying behind me.  And it was close, as they both finished less than 10 seconds behind me.  But I appreciate the push they gave me!

In the relay portion, the father/daughter relay team of Charlie Camacho (run) and Leahi Camacho (swim) took first place with a time of 44:37.  For the run only group, Chico Barrios finished first in 29:44, followed by Ariana Bahret in 29:55 and Alan Ryan in 29:59 (run-only participants started 15 minutes after the initial start).

In the peawee portion of the race, Kanaipono Eckart was first in 12:05, followed by a finned Lainey Eckart in 12:19 and Hana and her dog in 14:02.



The weekend before last had two races that I didn't recap.  The results from the unofficial Mango spring triathlon are here.  I haven't been able to find results from the Waikaumalo Challenge that I ran on the Hilo side of the island, but if those ever appear, I'll make sure to post them.

Up this weekend is the Run for Hops tomorrow morning at 7:30 a.m. at BMW Hawaii on Loloku Street.  This event features both a 5k and 10k and of course, post-race beer. See you out there!