Matt Hooley was so intent on getting a good time in the Eugene Marathon, he brought his own rabbit. The strategy paid off. Hooley finished in a course-record 2 hours, 18 minutes, 38 seconds to win the men’s portion of the third annual 26.2-mile race on a drizzly Sunday morning.
The 26-year-old from Madison, Wis., came in just under the U.S. Olympic Trials “A” standard of 2:19:00 to earn an automatic spot in the trials.
“I wanted to play it conservative today and just get the standard,” Hooley said. “That’s what I did — barely.”
It was also a personal record for Hooley in his first Eugene Marathon. His previous best was 2:19:50 in a win at the Houston Marathon in 2007, which at the time met the qualifying standard for the Olympic Trials marathon, a race he ran but didn’t finish in November of 2007 in New York City.
Coming in second place on Sunday in a field of 920 runners was Chad Worthen of Sacramento, who recorded a time of 2:26:36. Third place went to John Ngigi of Glide in 2:31:02.
Ngigi, who finished fourth in Eugene last year, won the Portland Marathon last October. Ian Fraser of Port Townsend, Wash., won the half marathon in 1:10:04.
“The course is great,” Hooley said. “It was pretty fast, very flat. There was nice long stretches of road so you could just get in a rhythm and go.”
Hooley, who correctly assumed the competition wouldn’t be able to maintain a strong pace — he did beat Worthen by nearly eight minutes — brought longtime friend, running partner and 2:16:0 marathoner Mike Reneau to push him.
“We’ve done a ton of runs together,” said Hooley, a former Division III track and cross country standout for Carleton College in Minnesota. “It was great to have an old friend with me. … We knew it was going to be a little bit bare in terms of competition. You gotta have company in a marathon. You can’t do it alone.”
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