Volte Runners Aiming for Houston Pass Their Tests at BCS Half Marathon

Somewhere in Sunday's field at the BCS Marathon and Half Marathon, there was a runner whose bib said, "I Love Steph".

It was supposed to be affixed to the shirt of our own Christopher Reed, confessing his undying love for his wife, Stephanie.

However, likely an error in the electronic file that was sent to the bib printer assigned bib names to others as randomly as a spin on "Wheel of Fortune".

And, boy o boy, were there some doozies in the mix-up.

Instead of "I Love Steph", Chris Reed seemed to enjoy the irreverent "Nooner" reference that he wore on his BCS Half Marathon run.

Stephanie was "Camryn Heye" for the day.

Roger and Robert King became "Kelli" and "Christi".  And if those ladies got their bib and were twins, well, they should all buy lottery tickets.

Kyley Hampton struck the "Big Bad Rosie Pose".

Who knew that "Jacob Blankenship" was Kim White's alter ego?

Darren Hadden got handed "Sanders".  Might have been fun to have put a Colonel in front of that with a Sharpie.

And so on it went.

Auggie Campbell was "Geoff".

Robert Cardnell became "Abby", and he ran with such acclaim that he could have moved into a starring role on "Downton Abbey".

Just call Devyn Cook "Daniel".

Randy Harris was "Krista".

Julie Stevenson was the only one that drew a same gender reference with "Celeste".

Buddies Michael Gayle and Scott Haney were "Kathryn" and "Mindy".

And Jane Campbell was just Jane.  

She had a VIP registration.  Guess the race was smart not to comingle those in the same data file.

Faith Craig had nothing, as they issued her bib on Saturday.

It definitely provided for a ton of laughs that likely loosened our folks -- aside from the great summer and fall training -- to eight personal bests and six age group awards on Sunday, December 12.

The day before, though, Kristi Park was the second woman overall in the Santa Dash 10K that was held on The Woodlands Waterway.  She earned the award in a time of 49:32, but because of a quickly approaching soccer match for Rylie she couldn't stay to claim it.

The organizer of the race, B.I.G. Love Cancer Care, actually ended up making the effort and delivering Kristi's award to her during the week.

If there was one person who bemoaned all of the COVID-19 cancellations last year, it was Judith Albarran.

But this year, she and Christopher Branch got caught in a different "Catch 22".

Prior to Tunnel Light, they had signed up for a number of races in the winter and spring.  However, Boston made a September house call to them both in North Bend, Washington.

So, like hell were they cancelling what they had already paid for - and they were off to Dallas this past weekend to run the BMW Dallas Marathon 5K on Saturday, December 11 and the BMW Dallas Marathon on Sunday, December 12.

And both exercised the self discipline to dial it back for their "A" races at the Chevron Houston Marathon in January.

They ran the 5K on Saturday together in 27:28, while Chris finished the marathon in 3:56:02 and Judith had a still impressive 4:05:43 - all from just taking it easy.

Faith Craig was our only marathoner at the BCS Marathon, where she finished in 5:17:03.

Her Dad, Thomas Thomson, finished in 4:50:55 while fellow Volte friend Jonathan Weishuhn did so in 3:45:49.

The main event for us was the BCS Half Marathon with 15 runners.  (Jason Bodie and Stephanie Stevenson were scheduled to run, but were not able to start.)

Robert led us with a strong performance that netted himself a sweet PR!
(Photo courtesy of Bill Dwyer)

Robert and Roger King got the hit parade started with first and second place age group finishes of 1:26:28 and 1:27:30, respectively.  Both were new personal bests for the brothers.

The next duo to the finish were Darren Hadden and Robert Cardnell as they rolled through with times of 1:32:28 and 1:35:16.

Robert Cardnell made 1:35 look ridiculously easy.
(Photo courtesy of Bill Dwyer)

Cardnell's effort was our third personal best of the morning.

Devin Cook and Jane Campbell both won hardware and set new PR's as they earned first and third place awards with their respective times of 1:36:02 and 1:42:22.

Jane Campbell looking pretty happy as she heads to the BCS Half Marathon finish line.
(Photo courtesy of Bill Dwyer)

Kim White was our sixth PR and fifth age group award winner with his first place effort of 1:45-even.

Finishing his tenth consecutive BCS Marathon event (two marathons and eight half marathons) was Randy Harris, who came in from Uvalde.  He finished in 1:49:18.

Which was also the identical time that Julie Stevenson used to record a new personal best -- and finish second in her age group.

Christopher and Stephanie Reed continued their "Run Together" tour from Chicago to College Station and crossed the finish line in 1:50:29.

Kyley Hampton's running has been on fire recently as she bested her previous best half marathon time once again with a time of 1:53:46.

Auggie Campbell, Michael Gayle and Scott Haney rounded out our bunch with Auggie leading with a time of 1:54:17 while Michael and Scott followed in 2:02:04 and 2:05:26, respectively.

A good group of our friends ran the half marathon as well.

Zero Dark Thirty's Brandon Sager was third in his age group in 1:25:48.  He was right behind Robert King just before making the left-hand turn on to George Bush near the 10-mile marker.

Former Volte coach and Aggie grad Adrienne Langelier was fourth overall and first in her age group in 1:28:40.

C. Stephenson Lake was third in her age group in 1:39:14 while Sonia Dhodapkar and Mariela Rodriguez rounded out our friends' performances in 1:49:25 and 2:31:21, respectively.

Volte friend Jon Walk on Saturday ventured down to Houston to take part in the Terry Hershey parkrun 5K #81.  

Much like Run The Woodlands, parkrun is a free, timed race that's run every single Saturday (except this year for Christmas).

You can get a bar code at parkrun.us, which you can used to get a time at any one of 40 parkruns in the US and so many more internationally, if you travel.

It was Jon's sixth time to run at Terry Hershey and it was his eighth different parkrun, which includes The Woodlands Waterway that hasn't returned to operation yet.