Kaua'i Half Marathon M55-59: Menovcik Runs Away With It

• Steve Menovcik won the M55-59 group in 1:42:46 (7:50/mi), finishing more than six minutes clear of runner-up Todd Meadows.
• Meadows (1:49:12) and Hyo Lim (1:54:15) locked up 2nd and 3rd, with Lim holding off Tom Taylor by just under two minutes for the final podium spot.
• Tom Taylor was the group's biggest mover in the back half, climbing from 151st to 126th among the men between the start and the finish line.
• Five minutes separated 5th-place Steve Fowler (1:58:52) from 6th-place Christopher Holmes (1:58:58) — six seconds across 13.1 miles.

Steve Menovcik turned the M55-59 race into a solo time trial. The 56-year-old from Grand Ledge, Michigan, ran a 7:50/mi average through 77°F humidity on Kaua'i's south shore and was never seriously threatened, steadily climbing from 46th to 44th among the men as the race wore on. His margin of victory — six minutes and 26 seconds over Todd Meadows — was decisive enough that the real competition for the podium was happening well behind him.

Meadows, a local from Kihei, earned 2nd in 1:49:12 with a strong closing leg, moving from 80th to 74th among the men in the final stretch. Behind him, King of Prussia's Hyo Lim (59 years old, the oldest man on the M55-59 podium) held 3rd in 1:54:15, though he slipped from 101st to 111th among the men late in the race — a sign the humid conditions took their toll. Tom Taylor of Phoenix was applying pressure, climbing steadily with one of the group's better second halves, but Lim's cushion was enough.

The battle for 5th was the race's most dramatic finish. Fowler and Holmes ran the entire 13.1 miles to within six seconds of each other — 1:58:52 to 1:58:58 — with Fowler, a local from Kapaa, edging the man from Amesbury, Massachusetts. In a 68-man field spread across more than two hours of racing, those six seconds were as tight as it got.