RIYADH — Mohammed Foustok and Claudine Roghi took the honors in the second Subway Riyadh Marathon held at a farm to the south of Riyadh Friday. The event proved to be a spectacular success, with 34 individual runners and 38 teams finishing the full 26.2-mile course. Saudi runner Foustok took an early lead in the male race, although Nawar Al-Otaibi remained on his heels for 2 laps before he ran out of steam. Foustok asserted his dominance thereafter, lapping several runners on the hilly and blustery 5-lap course and cruising to a straightforward victory in a time of 2:50:15, with Al-Otaibi maintaining a good tempo and coming in second in 3:10:08. Jean Pierre Berthiaux, the clear winner in the 50+ Master category, pushed himself to the limit as usual, leaving a large group of younger runners in his wake as he finished in a superb time of 3:23:53. In the ladies' race, Claudine Roghi (France/NZ), the outstanding female runner of 2014-15 season, ran into a commanding lead, paced by her compatriot and training partner Pierre Delbecq. Roghi kept up the same pace throughout, and received loud cheers as she ran through the spectators and runners at the start/finish line 4 times. She finished in 3:46:24, her lead never in question, and despite the hilly course was just two minutes outside her personal best time, set in Dubai in January. Katerina Holeckova was the winner in the Open female category, running her usual steady tempo, appearing calm and unflustered throughout and finishing in a highly respectable time of 4:16:59. In the team race, the competition was tight between two teams from the US. The USA Eagles eventually prevailed, their four runners completing the 8-lap course in a time of 3:15:20, a mere 4 minutes in front of the second placed team Tun Tavern. Overall it was a great day out. The Riyadh Road Runners, organizers of the event, thanked Subway for its generous sponsorship, and Sport Season for supplying the high quality race shirts. With the money raised from the race, the Riyadh Road Runners were also able to make a SR10,000 donation to SANAD Children's Cancer Society. — SG
