December 2015


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The rain didn’t dampen the spirits of the half-marathoners when Jehue Gordon fired the starting pistol at 5.30am for the 12th UWI SPEC International Half-Marathon on October 25. Since its inception in 2004, the race has grown tremendously and this year, 1,200 local, regional and international athletes competed.

The prizes were awarded at a ceremony on November 18 at UWI SPEC, St Augustine (full results are available on Pages 16 & 17), where male, female, wheelchair and physically-challenged athletes received their prizes across some 30 categories; but we wanted to share some of the special moments with the winners with you here.

Kenyan Caroline Kiptoo retained this year’s women’s title, with local champ Tonya Nero taking the both second place overall and the top T&T female runner. T&T female runners dominated the Top 5 with locals Celine Lestrade and April Francis also placing 4th and 5th respectively. There were no T&T nationals placing among the Top 5 Male athletes; these places went to Richer Perez (Cuba), Kenneth Rotich (Kenya), Kirk Brown (Jamaica), Pedro Espinoza-Perez (Mexico) and Rupert Green (Jamaica) respectively.

The National Amateur Athletic Association (NAAA) recognises The UWI SPEC International Half-Marathon as its official half-marathon championship. First Citizens also continued as presenting sponsor for this year’s half-marathon.