For the first time in its history, officials had to shut down the Vermont City Marathon before all the runners could finish, due to dangerously hot conditions. The race was shut down just a couple of minutes before noon yesterday.
Vermont City Marathon officials say runners who were forced to leave the race may still receive finishers' medals. Many runners were transported to the finish area on shuttle buses, like Megan Swann of Swanton was one of them:
"I was hoping to finish and I didn't. They pulled us off at mile 24. I had been running for 4 and a half hours", said Swann.
Nicole Ravlin of RunVermont says runners can receive medals regardless of whether they finished their full marathon or half-marathon distance:
"If you've trained to do a half-marathon or full marathon", says Ravlin,"a medal is the least we can do to ease the pain of the training that you've done."
Runners should email info@runvermont for details about receiving medals from Sunday's race.
Even those who were able to finish the race, including the winners, talked about the heat. Mens' division winner for a record sixth time Matt Pelletier of Connecticut told the Burlington Free Press "It's hot as gravy out there", but that didn't stop Pelletier from winning the race with a time of 2 hours, 23 minutes and 2 seconds.
Teague O'Connor of Burlington was the top Vermont finisher in the mens' division, with a time of 2 hours, 35 minutes and 17 seconds.
On the womens' side it was Madeline Duhon of Somerville, Mass. taking the title with a time of 2 hours, 50 minutes, and 7 seconds.That finish denied Heidi Westover of what would have been a record seventh first place womens' division finish, instead placing fifth overall in the blistering conditions.
Leah Frost of Glover was the first Vermont woman to cross the line and Jeremy Shortsleeve was the winner in the handcyclist division.
While runners were slogging through the hot as gravy heat in Burlington yesterday, in Chester, Pennsylvania, the Middlebury Womens' lacrosse team was busy winning the NCAA Division three championship, defeating Trinity 9-5 to take the title. It's the sixth championship for the Panthers, but their first since 2004, and it was an almost wire to wire perfect season for the Oanthers, who went 22-1 including the title game win yesterday over the only team that beat them for that one regular season loss. Middlebury goalie Katie Mandigo was named the tournament MVP, and made eight saves in the title game win.
The 100th running of the Indy 500 saw a rookie driver take the checkered flag. Twenty-four year old Alexander Rossi of California was the surprise winner, and he finihsed litertally on fumes, crossing teh finish line first after his tank had been emptied of gas, but still beating the second place car by four and a half seconds.
In Major League baseball the Boston Red Sox were in danger of getting swept by the Blue Jays in Toronto and suffering their fourth loss in a row, but Dustin Pedroia came up with a clutch RBI double in extra innings to keep that from happening, and Red Sox fans can also thank the much-maligned Clay Buchholz for helping get the win, too.
Buchholz, who has likely lost his slot in the starting rotation with a slew of ineffective starts and an ERA hovering near six, made an appearance out of the bullpen yesterday, throwing a scoreless tenth inning with the game tied at three. After Pedroia doubled home the eventual winning run, Koji Uehara finished off the Jays in the 11th for a 5-3 Red Sox win. Closer Craig Kimbrel was unavailable after throwing a career high thirty-nine pitches in what amounted to a double-blown save the previous day. And if, like me, you're sad about not having Jackie Bradley Jr.'s hitting streak to watch anymore after it eneded at 29 games, there is Xander Bogaerts making a run of his own, extending his current hitting streak to twenty-two games yesterday, The Sox couldn't do anything against Toronto's RA Dickey until the 6th. They hadn't collected a hit until that inning, when Mookie Betts broke it up with a triple and the Sox went on to score three times. David Price pitched well for the Sox, giving up just a two-run homer to Jose Bautista, but did not factor in the decision. IN fact it was Buchholz who picked up the win. The Sox move on to Baltimore today to open up a four-game set against the Orioles, who start the day one game behind Boston for first place in the AL East.
The NY Yankees were getting no-hit yesterday as well, all the way into the 7th inning in Tampa, and managed just one hit against Rays' starter Jake Oridozzi, but guess what? That hit was a two-run homer by Starlin Castro and held up as the game winner in the Yankees' 2-1 win over the last place Rays. Nathan Eovaldi got the win for the Yanks, and the three-headed Yankees bullpen monster of Betances, Miller, and Chapman made quick work of the Rays in the 7th, 8th and 9th to make sure that one hit would hold up for the win.
In Queens, Adrian Gonzalez broke a 9th inning tie with a 2-run single off NY Mets' closer Jeurys Familia and the L.A. Dodgers beat the Mets 4-2. The Dodgers could have won the game earlier but the Mets got to the Dodgers bullpen after ace starter Clayton Kershaw was lifted in the 8th. Curtis Granderson hit a game tying triple but Gonzalez bailed out the pen with his winning hit in the 9th.
Lots of stars take the courts at Roland Garros today in the French Open Tennis tournament. Number one seed Novak Djokovic is in action about 45 minutes from now and number one womens' seed Serena Williams is in action at 10am. Her sister Venus takes on Timea Bacsinszky at noon, and underdog American Shelby Rogers, ranked 108th in the world, is still on the mix after her upset win over 28th ranked Irina-Camelia Begu.
Tonight, big basketball game in Oakland. The Golden State Warriors try to complete a 3 games to 1 deficit comeback against the Oklahoma City Thunder to keep their hopes for back to back NBA championships alive. Awaiting the winner of tonight's winner take all game 7 is Lebron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.
