- 9 August, 2006 -

Taylor Adams gave herself a good send-off to the University of Georgia. The former Sprayberry track and cross country standout and newest member of the Georgia cross country and track teams, is headed to Athens with a second Run for Life championship after winning the women's 5K race at the 23rd annual Cobb County event at Roberts Business Park in Kennesaw. It was also a good day for Ethiopia, as a pair of runners from the east African nation swept the men's titles, with Tamrat Ayalew winning the men's 10K championship and Fikadu Deme taking the men's 5K title. Joining Adams, Ayalew and Deme on the victory platform was Nancy Stewart of Atlanta, who was the winner of the women's 10K race. Adams clinched the women's 5K title with a time of 21:51, finishing ahead of fellow Marietta resident Katharine Trapp (22:41) and Orion Wilson of Atlanta (23:03). It was the second Run for Life 5K championship in three years for Adams, who also won the title in 2004. "It was a good race," Adams said. "It gives me a boost of confidence going into the cross country season at Georgia." Ayalew, who trains with the Foot Solution running club of Fayetteville, led the men's 10K race from start to finish and crossed the finish line with a time of 31:57, placing just two seconds ahead of fellow Ethiopian and Foot Solution teammate Belay Teka (31:50) and Zablon Mokoya of Marietta (33:01). "The race was good," said Ayalew, a member of the Ethiopian national team who once ran a 2:12:00 marathon in Japan and finished 29th at the Peachtree Road Race (31:40) last month. "I wanted to run under 31 minutes, but I did good." Things didn't go quite as smoothly for the men's 5K winner, with Deme taking a wrong turn during the race, but managing to get back on track to finish with a time of 17:04. Deme placed ahead of Marietta residents Valentin Alvarez (18:27) and Miles Svoboda (18:33), a rising junior cross country and track standout at Pope. "My best time in the 5K is 14:43, so I would have done much better if I didn't go the wrong way," Deme said. "I could have run it around 15:04 or 15:05." The 50-year old Stewart won the women's 10K with a time of 42:33, finishing ahead of Jenny Mascaro of Stone Mountain (45:18) and women's masters winner Michelle Laflure of Acworth (45:34). "I wanted to go easy the first couple of miles and then go up to faster pace after that," Stewart Print Version Page 1 of 2 http://www.mdjonline.com/articles/2006/08/06/92/10227244.prt 8/9/2006 said. "The course was great. Take away the heat and maybe I would have gone a little faster." Former McEachern standout and Adams' Georgia teammate Brian Potts finished fourth in the men's 10K (36:10), with Kennesaw Mountain runner David May (fifth, 36:16), former KMHS runner Thomas Clarke (seventh, 38:16) and former McEachern runner Kyle Chapman (38:46) also finishing in the top 10 of the men's 10K. Other masters winners were Anastacio Barbosa of Seagrove Beach, Fla., a sixth-place overall finisher, in the men's 10K (36:58), Paul Drury of Atlanta, a fourth-place overall finisher, in the men's 5K (18:40) and Kathy Espe of Kennesaw, a 13th-place overall finisher, in the women's 5K (26:12).

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