Broken Arrow 5-Mile: Steve Sievert Runs Away from the M50-59 Field

• Sievert wins by 10:45, finishing in 1:00:43 at a 12:09/mi average — nearly 11 minutes clear of the field on a course topping out above 7,100 feet.
• The closest finish of the day: Josh Amato (2nd) and Erik Jensen (3rd) were separated by just 0.12 seconds — 1:11:28.32 vs. 1:11:28.44 — with Amato edging Jensen for the silver spot.
• A field spread wide: from Sievert's 1:00:43 to Armando Enriquez's 2:37:14, the 11 finishers covered a range of 1 hour, 36 minutes and change.

Steve Sievert, 56, out of Spring, TX, turned in a performance that demanded attention. His 12:09/mi average on a high-altitude course ranging up to 7,191 feet — with thin air and a 17 mph wind adding to the challenge — put him in a different race from everyone else. He crossed the line in 1:00:43, and by the time second place came through, nearly 11 minutes had elapsed. Whatever the altitude did to the rest of the field, it didn't seem to slow Sievert down.

The real drama in this race unfolded just behind him. Amato, 51, from St. Louis, and Jensen, 53, from Seattle, ran the entire 5 miles to what amounted to a dead heat — except it wasn't. Amato took 2nd by 0.12 seconds, a margin so slim it only shows up in the decimal places. Both men finished at 1:11:28 by the clock, but the timing system had the final word: Amato ahead, Jensen 3rd.

Rick Estes (4th, 1:20:46) and Brian Wyatt (5th, 1:25:30) rounded out the top five, with Chris Jones, Brian Campagna, Ivan Ng, Daniel Darby, and Todd Glieden filling out the middle of the field between 1:30 and 1:44. Armando Enriquez, 55, brought it home in 2:37:14 — a 31:27/mi average that suggests a very tough day on the mountain, but a finisher is a finisher at Broken Arrow.