Thursday, April 02, 2009

What and why some are running the MDS and the LONG day at MDS!!!


http://www.active.com/donate/colleenwoods_RTF
Above! Our own Colleen Woods and Teresa!
Colleen is running and raising money for Aids Orphans Rising!!










Byron Powell is run for
Village of Hope





Below is Dreamchaser Anton who is running his 1st MDS!!




Connie Carpenter! Running for Abundent after school water program!






Becky Clements with Sister Marybeth. Becky is running for
Aids Orphans Rising!


















Terry Madl! Last year at the finish line of the 2008 MDS. This year so far he is way ahead of last year:)
















Kerri Elfvins is running for the Jacksonville Humane Society!!! She is already over her goal:)



Francis LaBrune is running for Aids Orphans Rising!! Check out the article in the paper.

This information below has been taken off the race web site. There are still people out on the course who have not completed the 50 mile stage. The results will be posted, we all have to be patient..I know it is not easy. Dreamchasers are running very well:) The men's team as it stands right now for overall places are
Mike 10th
Ted 19th
Bryon 20th
This is wonderful!
Meaghan Hicks is having an amazing race..she is in 2nd overall:)

33 retirements at 9.30am

3rd stage Men ranking 1 Mohamad Ahansal
(2-Morocco) 8h08m22s2 Aziz El Akad
(3-Morocco) 8h23m23s 3 Mustapha Ait Amar
(8- Morocco) 8h30m15s4
Salameh El Aqrah (357- Jord) 8h47m23s5
Anton Vencelj (220 – SlovĂ©nia) 8h47m23s6
Aurelio Antonio Olivar Roldan (529- Spain) 9h27m34s7
Lorenzo Trincheri (460 – Italy) 9h27m55s8
Julio Gomez Camacho (473-Spain ) 9h35m45s9
Marco Olmo (297 – Italy) 9h42m49s10
Michael Wardian (870 USA) 9h51m59s

General ranking
1 Mohamad Ahansal (2-Morocco) 13h32m57s
2 Aziz El Akad (3-Morocco) 6m20s (time difference with top runner)
3 Salameh El Aqrah (357- Jord) 37m41s (time difference with top runner)
4 Anton Vencelj (220 – Slovenia) 1h28m57s (time difference with top runner)
5 Mustapha Ait Amar (8- Morocco) 1h37m40s (time difference with top runner)
6 Lorenzo Trincheri (460 – Italy) 1h48m59s (time difference with top runner)
7 Michael Wardian (870 USA) 1h57m37s (time difference with top runner)
8 Samir Akhdar (4-Morocco) 2h00m52s (time difference with top runner)
9 Lhoucine Akhdar (5 – Morocco) 2h04m29s (time difference with top runner)

3rd stage Women ranking1 Touda Didi (265- Morocco) 11h52m49s
2 Meghan Hicks (825 – USA) 12h01m07s
3 Luz Perez Carbajo (480 – Spain) 12h12m35s
4 Simone Keyzer (434 – Luxembourg) 13h10m50s
5 Rosa Espachs Olivera (504- Spain) 13m31s10s

General ranking
1 Touda Didi (265- Morocco) 19m13m52s
2 Meghan Hicks (825 – USA) 44m33s (time difference with top runner)
3 Luz Perez Carbajo (480 – Spain) 1h06m07s (time difference with top runner)
4 Simone Keyzer (434 – Luxembourg) 2h24m36s (time difference with top runner)
5 Jennifer Salter (782- GB) 2h41m20s (time difference with top runner)

Such an intense, tough and stunning stage! Scoop of the day is for sure the retirement of the great favourite Lahcen Ahansal. The 10 times winner champion threw in the sponge at check point 4. Not really fit since the start of the race, accentuated by a lack of training after his previous year' break, he left the vicotry escape. He took the hard decision to give up, informing his brother between chek points 3 and 4. Mohamad moved to top speed and left the Jordanian Al Aqrah and the Moroccan Aziz Al Akad on the spot. Taking advantage of his incredible pace, he did not get some rest on check point 5, cooling down his rivals' ardour. He reached the finish line, with almost 15 minutes ahead before Aziz Al Akad and rob him of his first place. Tomorrow will be an unique opportunity for the 2 top leaders to have a bit of a fight, considering other runners are « out » for the first place.The slovenian Anton Vancelj gave renew proof of his great shape, with a beautiful fourth ranking.
On the women's side, as to amazing Touda Didi, the fireworks go on with no true pretender. Her timing would rank her in the top 30 men ranking. She should finish this stunning week with a well deserved title.
The race direction has decided to cancel the saturday's stage. The 24th Marathon des Sables will complete after the tomorrow's last 42km long stage.





5 comments:

Lisa Smith-Batchen said...

results are all in at this time!

I just pulled this from the web site.

Because of the exceptional weather conditions throughout the Marathon, the safety does not allow the setting of a new bivouac in the area. The race organisation has therfore decided to cancel the saturday's stage. The 24th Marathon des Sables will come to an end with a last 42km long stage on friday.

Lisa

Anonymous said...

The long stage ... 57 miles this year (longest ever at MDS). The obsessive among you already know that I finished the stage 19th. But, did you check the TEAM rankings? Dreamchasers USA is currently in 2nd place, poised for the first-ever American team medal. Neat.

Yesterday began with 15 miles of wet, mushy desert terrain (leftover from the flood). It stuck to the shoes. To make matters worse, we faced a 20-30 mph headwind for the first 30 miles. By that point, I was a mess and alternated walking and running for the duration.

The rumor is that, due to the flooding, the final stage has been cancelled, meaning that tomorrow (Friday) will be the final stage. A marathon and then done. I'm okay with that. Though shortened, this year's race has been tough because of difficult-to-run terrain.

Ted

Anonymous said...

FROM MIKE:
J, Hey hope all is well with you guys and you are having a nice morning. I ran 9:52, so slow for the last 26K (3:02), but I went out with the leaders and was running in 4th position till the last check point; however, I was short on water for 40K and it caught up on me huge over the last 12K. I had to walk for a while till I could rebound and run it in. I did hold 7th place overall but my lead is only a few minutes so I need to run hard tomorrow on the marathon stage (which might be longer). I would like to get a stage win but not sure how I will feel as I have been running to the bathroom since yesterday, not good but I am staying up on my fluids so hope I can be ready for tomorrow and put in a great effort. I am 9 mins down on 6th and 20 mins down on 5th. They all put big amounts of time on me yesterday. A bunch of the guys in my pack dropped from the race Lachen, 2 Jordanians,1 Spainard. I went for the win yesterday and suffered but it was worth it.
Mike Wardian

FROM RACE WEB SITE:
Finally a glimpse of Mike in one of the videos! Click the last video file on this page, he's at the very end, he walks into the shot then starts jogging with the crowd (white baseball hat & sunglasses on):
http://www.darbaroud.com/uk/html/mds/24mds/videos/uk_24mds_videos_0402.php

Anonymous said...

hi lisa
good job on posting this information, it can not be easy to keep up with, it was hard enough for us to follow one runner.
you should be very proud of all the dreamchaser people, as we know you are. we sure are.

nyc

Meredith said...

Thanks for all your great updates, Lisa.