Perfect Start for Winners

First-timers usually don’t perform like this--neither do most veterans for that matter--but Gary Stolz and Niahm Nicholas aren’t typical newcomers.

Stolz and Nicholas, former college All-American distance runners at Stanford and Oregon, respectively, blew away their fields in winning the men’s and women’s divisions of the 15th Long Beach Marathon on Sunday.

For both, it was their first time running a marathon.

“I was thinking that my running career was over because it was getting ugly,” said a smiling Stolz of the marathon’s toughest moments after enduring severe tightening in his thigh muscles. “But I’ve been doing this for so long and know what it’s like when you start thinking bad things. You have to purposely ignore yourself to make it.”

Stolz, a 10-kilometer specialist, came back from a 100-yard deficit in mile 16 to overtake Brazil’s Francismar de Barros in mile 20, eventually winning in a time of 2 hours 19 minutes 46 seconds. The mark qualified Stolz for May’s 2000 U.S. Olympic trials in Pittsburgh, which will be his next marathon.

De Barros finished third in 2:31:01 after leading for much of the race and appearing ready to pull away before hamstring problems forced him to slow considerably.

With De Barros hampered, Gardena’s Jose Ortiz Pina moved up in the final two miles to finish second, but he finished nearly 10 minutes behind Stolz in 2:29:19.

Stolz, a native of Woodside in Northern California, said he benefited greatly from two of his Team Nike teammates who served as race rabbits in the early going.

Trent Bryson and Ray Appenheimer shielded Stolz from the wind during the first third of the race as an initial pack of six runners stayed close. After Bryson dropped out at mile eight, Appenheimer stayed with the leaders until mile 13 before Stolz finally went to work.

“I couldn’t ask anything more from those guys; they were perfect,” Stolz said. “Trent kept me right there through the first eight and Ray was awesome until the 13th. I really owe those guys a lot of beer.”

Nicholas also used a rabbit--her friend Katy Spink--during the first seven miles to establish and maintain a strong early pace as she took control of the women’s race and was never threatened.

The Mill Valley resident, who qualified for February’s Olympic trials in Columbia, S.C., finished in 2:37:06, well ahead of second-place Katy Hollbacher of Berkeley, timed in 2:49:36. Lisa Kelp of Aliso Viejo was third in 2:56:08.