Sound to narrows: Tollefson, French take runs into record book

TACOMA — Sound to Narrows winners Eric Tollefson and Angela French both wrote a bit of history in yesterday's 30th renewal of Tacoma's largest road race.

French, 43, became the oldest woman to win the 12K event. Monroe's Vicki Foltz, the previous oldest, was 36 when she won in 1980.

Tollefson, trying to save himself for today's Run the World race in Everett, in which the race winners receive round-trip airfare to Paris and spending money, had Sound to Narrows' slowest winning time. His 38:35 was one minute behind than the previous record and nearly two minutes off his 2000 personal-best 36:42.

After jogging across the finish line yesterday, Tollefson somewhat facetiously said, "At two miles, I was going for the slowest winning time ever. I've never looked back so much. But I never saw anybody. I think I'm in shape for the course record, but I just wanted to run as fast as I needed to win."

The 29-year-old Tollefson, from Tacoma, will run Atlanta's prestigious Peachtree Race on July 4.

"I have no plans after that," he said. "I may run my first marathon this fall, but I've been saying that for three or four years."

French, a Lacey resident who grew up in this area before moving to Arizona for two decades, spent nearly the entire race believing that she was fourth.

"I had no idea I was first until I was going up the final hill," she said.

"Then people started telling me that I was leading. I wasn't sure I believed them until I heard the announcer."

She also had no idea how close her pursuers were.

"I just feared that someone was behind me," she said. "Just before the finish, I turned and there she (runner-up Jennifer Dimoff) was."

The two women finished within a second of each other, with French clocking 47:39.

"My right calf tightened up," she said. "I'm glad I didn't have to run any further."

More than 5,600 runners and walkers entered the 12K and accompanying 5K races, with nearly 4,000 doing the longer distance. The day's total swelled to more than 10,000 runners with the addition of 4,500 military personnel, who ran the 12K earlier in the morning.

Mark VanEycke of Fircrest won the men's 5K for the third year in a row, clocking 16:12. In the women's 5K, Nicole Cochran of Spanaway knocked more than 1½ minutes off her winning time from last year as an 11-year-old, but still finished second as Janeth Alder of Lakewood, the 12K winner last year, dropped down and won in 18:10. Cochran's time was 18:27.