Frost blazes a trail in California
Frosty takes on fuel at one of the many aid stations
Anna Frost entered unknown territory in San Francisco yesterday, and emerged a genuine ultra-trail runner, demolishing a world-class field at the TNF Endurance Series final. The Kiwi power-house showed (along with mens winner Miguel Heras) that long distance mountain running prowess can easily translate to the trails…
Not least of her achievements was winning the biggest purse of her running career, a cool $10,000!
“I am absolutely ecstatic. The race was super-tough, and I went through a host of emotions out there. The course was amazing, the support on the route was fantastic, and it was so great to come here to California and run against some of the best ultra-trail runners.
But most of all I am so happy to have won, and grateful for all of the support that I have received over the last weeks from friends, family, runners and the guys at Salomon.”
Anna Frost
Both the men’s and the women’s races were won by steady running early on, followed by the increase of pressure over the second-half of the race. For Frost this meant a battle early on with the UK’s Lizzy Hawker. A number of DNS’s in the women’s race meant that it was going to be down to these two.
Hawker set off at a pace Frost deemed a little too hot, especially as this was her first 50. But approaching Bootjack for the second time (28 miles) the New Zealander attacked on the hill, going past Hawker, and this proved to be the winning move of the race.
From here on Frost used her considerable mountain skills on the technical sections through the Marin trails, extending her advantage through Tennesee Valley all the way into the finish – eventually winning by a full 14 minutes.
In the men’s race Spain’s Miguel Heras used his endurance running nouse, biding his time as Western States 100 winner Geoff Roes and top US trailer Dave Mackey headed up affairs for the first 40 miles. Approaching the Tennesee Valley aid station (42 miles) Heras made a big move, passing Roes, and extended this over the final 5 miles, to take the 10 grand men’s prize.
Miguel Heras
Results online here and more great coverage by our US ultra buddies over at iRunFar.com
An interview regarding Frosties big win soon come on MST!
Anna Frost at the TNFEC
Reactions so far
Flo and Om Dec 6, 11:34 PM
Amazing achievement, Anna! We couldn’t imagine running so far, so steep and so fast…