Cebu’s premiere running event Written by Nimrod NL Quiñones

By NIMROD NL QUIÑONES

The Cebu City Marathon last Sunday proved that it truly is the premiere event in Cebu with around 8,000 participants in the three distances that were raced.

The huge turnout for the full marathon, which spans a distance of 42.195 kilometers, highlights how crazy the Cebuanos are about running.

With races held here practically every weekend, it is no surprise that more people can now run distances that many once only dreamed of.

As expected the Kenyans dominated the full marathon, which started at 4 a.m. last January 8.

After the gun start, fireworks lit up the skies at the Cebu Asiatown IT Park to signal the beginning of the race that took the runners around key streets of Cebu City including the Subway of the South Road Properties.

An hour later, the runners for the 21-K half marathon started their race.  This time, while a Kenyan topped the men’s event, a Cebuana, Mary Grace de los Santos, broke the juggernaut of the Africans, as she ruled the distaff side.

The biggest bulk of runners were still those who took part in the 5-K fun run that also had a huge delegation composed of students from the University of Cebu.

Organizers did not scrimp of the festivities with live music, raffles, and a lot of freebies awaited the participants.

The event was organized by the Cebu Executive Runners Club.

Next year, organizers are thinking of scrapping the 5-K distance so that a 10-K race would be held instead.

One of the race organizers once said that the goal of the race is to also raise the bar for the sport of running in Cebu.

The 3-K runners are encouraged to run 5-K and those who do 5-K and 10-K are encouraged to run the half marathon.

Then, those who usually run half marathons are encouraged to go for the full marathon.

There is so much to look forward to next year and I’m sure not only the Cebu runners are eager to be part of the Cebu City Marathon again, but also those from other parts of the country and abroad.

The start of the full marathon.

More participants take off for the 42-K event.

The participants of the 21-K event start their run.

Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama celebrates after completing the 5-K run.

One of the Kenyans who dominated the event.

There was also a lot of fun and not just serious competition.

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