Joe 'DQ' dances his way into 7th place at Lake Sonoma 50 Miler.  Alan completes the Barkley Marathon 'Fun Run' and lives to tell the tale.

Craig tries to scare Meghan with his sub 4:00 Pemberton 50k into thinking he is fit.  She shows him what's what at Chuckanut, putting 11 minutes on him by the end.

Team Sunsweet has been busy of late - Meghan decided to prolong the agony of getting into the Olympic Trials by missing the standard by 41 seconds at the Napa Valley Marathon.  Bev smoked the Pony Express 50 mile, coming in first overall, while Joe took the prize in the 50k.  At Way Too Cool, Bev scores a second, with Joe in 23rd and Alan in 24th.  Alan proceeded to school Craig in the Cool mountain bike race the following day, with Bev winning her race.  It's gonna be a long year...... 

Bev continued her dominance of the California scene at the Woodside 50k, despite getting off course.  Again.  Alan still couldn't catch her, but finished in a respectable 5th.  Meanwhile, Joe got 'kidded' at the Jed Smith 50 Mile but dusted the rest of the field.  Meanwhile, up in Oregon, Craig managed to hold off Meghan in the Truffle Shuffle, but she won the Truffles. 

Bev, Alan and Joe partook in a windy, wet Redding Marathon.  Bev repeated her win for the who-knows-how-many-times!  Joe bettered his time from last year for a 4th place finish, and Alan ran a respectable 8th place the day after a bike race.

It was a good year for Team Sunsweet-Sporthill! In 2009, Beverly Anderson-Abbs continued her dominance, winning two marathons, three 50-kilometer events, one 50-mile race and icing her season off with a women’s victory at the Javelina 100-mile race. Bev, how do you do it? Meghan Arbogast brought some international exposure to the team, traveling all the way to Torhout, Belgium, to compete alongside runners from 19 other countries at the IAU World Cup 100k. Meghan followed that 62-mile run with a 100-miler a week later. Whew! She finished sixth at the Western States 100 Mile Endurance Run.

And speaking of Western States, the California race known as “the Super Bowl of ultrarunning” continued to be a focal point for Team Sunsweet-Sporthill in 2009. The Sunsweet-sponsored Robinson Flat Aid Station went off in typical fashion with cowbells ringing, crowds cheering and runners basking in the glow of so many smiling and supportive faces. Robinson Flat (29.7 mi.) is the first major aid station at Western State – the first point where crews and supporters can see their runners – and because it’s still (relatively) early in the race, very few runners have dropped. This makes it a high-exposure aid station and continues to present a great sponsorship opportunity for Sunsweet.  With crews and supporters decked out in shirts and headbands emblazoned with the Sunsweet logo, the team continued to fly the flag for the company that supports the race and, once again, we all heard plenty of supporters cheering us on throughout the race with cries of “Go Sunsweet!” or, our personal favorite, “Go Sunsweetie!”  Bev bested everyone on the team at Western States, finishing in third place among the women at 19 hours, 53 minutes. Lewis Taylor finished behind her in 19:58, which was good for 15th place male. Craig Thornley was 17th at 20:18, Meghan was sixth among the women at 21:33, Jeff Riley was 25th male at 21:38 and Alan Abbs was right behind him at 21:41.  It was a great day and all of Team Sunsweet-Sporthill is grateful for the support of Sunsweet Growers!

Other highlights of 2009 for the team included a second place finish for Dan Olmstead at the Way Too Cool 50k. Dan-O ran 3:42 for his second top three finish at the ultra-competitive ultra in as many years. He followed up several weeks later with a sixth place finish at another big California race, the American River 50 miler. Ultra-newcomer Joe Palubeski topped his opening year off with a victory at the Sierra Nevada 100k, Alan ran for third at the Oak Mountain 50k (Bev, of course, won the thing!) and Jeff ran
for fifth place at the Quicksilver 50-miler. Jeff, Craig and Lewis all showed they weren’t afraid to brave the concrete. They went to Medford for the Pear Blossom 10-mile run and all three finished in the top 30. Not bad for a bunch of ultra-guys!

For Meghan, who just can’t seem to get enough racing, a November run at the JFK 50-Mile Race seemed a good idea. She capped off her impressive season by finishing second for the women with a time of 6 hours, 56 minutes. Bev and Meghan both ran well at the Where’s Waldo 100K, finishing second and third for the women, respectively. Sunsweet’s sponsorship of the August race at Oregon’s Willamette Pass Ski Area went far this year, as the race profile rose significantly. In addition to being a USATF 100
kilometer National Championship for masters runners and overall runners, the event became part of the prestigious Montrail Ultra Cup. The top two finishers in Ultra Cup events earn spots at Western States, which gave runners added incentive on top of the prize money already offered by Sunsweet and other sponsors!  At “Waldo,” Craig served as co-race director of the event (which he also co-founded) and Alan was the elite athlete coordinator. Their hard work paid off and the race was, once again, impeccably organized and well supported by fans.

As if running thousands of miles each year weren’t enough, Team Sunsweet-Sporthill members were active in the running community, volunteering to run aid stations and provide other support at numerous events. Once again, Bev and Alan put on the Sunsweet Tehama Wildflowers 50k race in April, putting on another successful event in Red
Bluff. Craig and Dan worked the Dimple Hill Aid Station at McDonald Forest 50k in May, bringing a “Big Lebowski” theme to the race. Craig applied his ultra-enthusiasm to at least two other Oregon races and his Western States-themed running site “Conduct the Juices” (http://ix.cs.uoregon.edu/~thornley/conduct-the-juices/) went from a fledgling blog to a site that is now required reading for anyone interested in west coast ultrarunning.

Thank you, Sunsweet and Sporthill, for making 2009 a great year for our team. Here’s to more successes and a continued partnership in 2010!

Chasing down the course record only led to a disastrous race-end bonk.  However, Meghan's sub-7 hour finish put her in the top 5 runners in the history of this 47 year old race.  For more details, you know where to look!

Bev and Alan headed south this time for a romp in the dessert.  Although Alan succumbed to a sour stomach and hypothermia, Bev carried on to win the women's division.  Her is her take on the experience:

"After protecting my hamstring so carefully at Bizz Johnson I went out for a training run a week later, two weeks before Javelina, and tripped and tore my right hamstring.  I spent the next two weeks getting intensive physical therapy and massage, knowing I would not be pulling off anything close to a course record this time around.

Alan and I shared a hotel suite with David James and Mark Matyazik (1st and 2nd place) and enjoyed some pre-race chatting over dinner.  Morning arrived and we all headed to the race start to set up our "crew areas" although Alan and I would be on our own. It was dark and you couldn't make out all the costumes racers were wearing, but I did see a few very cool ones.  At 5:00 we headed off into the desert for the first of 7 laps.

At the end of lap 1 we turned to head the other way and got to see the Bumble Bee, Prisoner (who later teamed up with her Cop pacer), Rainbow Bright, and many others, including a rather disturbing male French Maid! This was a lot of fun to see the folks in costume.

Toward the second aid station on this lap I saw three wild mustangs by the side of the trail that didn't seem at all worried about the people running past.

Third lap was back the same way as the first so I got to see all of the jalloween costumes once again, as well as Dave James heading out looking like he was running a 10k race.

By the end of the fourth lap, I picked up Josh as a pacer.  Jamil, the RD, had hooked me up with him and Brian McKinley for the race.  Unforutnately by this point my hamstring had enough and I was running on painkillers and not much else.  Josh pushed me a little for this lap, but by the time I started Lap 6 I had more than two hours on the next woman so let Brian know that I would be protecting my leg and doing a lot of walking.  This gave us an opportunity to do a lot of talking and enjoy a beautiful full  moon night out there.  Brian got me through the final 25 miles, albeit slowly with still close to 2 hours lead and a very swollen leg.

David was amazing to watch as he shattered the course record, and Mark had a fantastic first 100 miler.  I am very proud to say I know them (and slept with them-in the same hotel room).  Both will be runners to watch in upcoming years.

As Alan and I were leaving the park we did see the elusive Javelina."

Bev and Alan take to the hills for the Bizz Johnson Marathon, while Meghan heads for the flat lands of the Midwest for the Twin Cities Marathon.  Bev scores a win and has this to say:

"The Bizz Johnson Trail Marathon is a fun romp through the woods of Northern California.  The course is on a gravel rail to trail that starts with a 600 foot climb over the first 6 miles.  This doesn't seem like much but at 5000, that steady grind, that looks like it should be flat, is tough!  After that, it's almost all downhill with the final 6 miles taking runners through the beautiful Susan River canyon and into two old railroad tunnels.

My plan for this run was to take it easy, this was not a race, but a final run in preparation for Javelina Jundred and I did not want do any further damage to my already painful hamstring.  I planned on doing about 7:15/mile to mile 13, then, if my hamstrings felt okay, pick up the pace to a 7:00/mile for the last half.  I stuck with this plan, everything felt pretty good at the half way point so I sped up to my pre-determined 7:00 minute pace.  I spent most of the time completely alone, except when I passed the occasional guys who gone out way too fast, offering words of encouragement. The final two miles were flat and I slowed down a little to enjoy the end of the trail and pretty river I was running along side, finishing in 3:08 and winning for women."

Alan ran 3:19 - good for 19th place among the men.  At Twin Cities, Meghan ran 2:50, which was good for 52nd place among women (I know, right?), and 10th USATF Master.

Joe 'Drama Queen' Palubeski gets his first win at the Sierra Nevada 100k, despite temperatures of 103!  Great job Joe!