Dan's Papers - October 5, 2007 - Marathons and Other Runs Show a Buff Side of the Hamptons

Last Saturday was the first ever Hampton Marathon and Half Marathon, and runners from all over New York showed up to compete. There were nearly 300 people that ran in the half marathon and about 170 people that braved the full, 26.2 miles through our Hampton roads. For some it was a race of determination, for others it was agony, and for still others it was to qualify themselves for bigger events such as the New York Marathon or the Boston Marathon. But for whatever reason, they woke up that morning and said to themselves, "Hey, I think I'll run 26.2 miles today."

The Hamptons Marathon really took off. Although it was not a huge mob of runners like in a city marathon, 500 runners was a great start. The course weaved through Amagansett, Springs and East Hampton with views of the Atlantic Ocean, Napeague Bay and even the Long Island Sound. It was also a USATF sanctioned and certified course. It was organized by Two Moons, LLC, which is a not-for-profit venture made possible through the generous support of organizations and individuals such as JetBlue Airways, SmartWater, Amaden Gay Agencies, The Manhattan Mortgage Company, Shape Magazine and Nike. Mickey's Carting also donated its waste removal services to clean up after and during the race.

It is pretty clear from this marathon that unlike the rest of America, we are one very healthy town. Jimmy Lynch, a 42-year-old local from East Hampton took first place in the half marathon with an impressive time of 1 hour and twelve minutes, maintaining a 5:34 mile the entire way. James G. Hillary of Philadelphia took second place and East Hampton's serial triathaloner Ben Turnbull, who is 25 and ran track for East Hampton High School, took third place with a pace of 5:45 minutes per mile. The top three marathon winners were not locals. Michael A. Arnstein, hailing from New York City took the race with a time of 2 hours and 44 minutes. He was trailed by just two seconds by Blake Benke, also of New York City. Third place came in fifteen minutes later by Chris Koegel from Merrick.

Just finishing a race of this length is an accomplishment, let alone doing it under four hours, but that didn't seem to stop Charlie Marder, the owner of Marders Landscaping in Bridgehampton, who at 54 years old and having never run a marathon before, managed to keep a pace of eight and a half minutes the entire way. "I don't consider myself a runner, but I trained for it, and you could say I had a home court advantage," he said.

Tom Rutkowski of Montauk also finished with a time of 3 hours and 30 minutes of running.

But it wasn't just the marathon that super athletes could participate in over the weekend. There was also the Mighty Man Sprint Triathlon (a 750-meter swim in Fort Pond, a 17-kilometer bike leg and a 5k run) as well as the Mighty Half Ironman (a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike and 12.1 mile run). Both took place in Montauk, which is one of the birthplaces of the triathlon. One of the sport's earliest events, the Mighty Hamptons Triathlon in Sag Harbor inspired a local Montauk Motel owner, fisherman and surfer, Robert Aaron to stage a triathlon in Montauk in 1983 (the Mighty Montauk).

If one were so inclined, one could run the marathon on Saturday and the Mighty Half Ironman on Sunday. We are very healthy here in the Hamptons, so Dan's Papers assigned an intern to attempt all three races over the weekend to see if she could spot anybody else doing the same thing. Of course, this didn't end up working out very well for the intern, so when she came back from the weekend claiming she was unable to complete all three, we sent her on another mission and had her compare all of the competitors in each event. According to her, there were no duplicate names, but we did notice that about 400 people ran the triathlon on Sunday and another 350 ran on Saturday. That, in combination with the marathon, meant that over a thousand people were racing in the Hamptons over the weekend during the off-season. Now that puts us on the crazy athlete map.