Dave Link reports for KnoxNewsIt was a good day to be a frontrunner Sunday morning.
Knoxville's Kathy Wolski and Geoffrey Kiprotich led from start to finish and won marathon titles in the sixth annual Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon.
Wolski, 44, defended her 2009 Knoxville Marathon title, after which she suffered a number of injuries that nagged her into the start of this year.
"It never ceases to amaze me how your body can overcome so many things," Wolski said. "God has designed our bodies to overcome anything."
Kiprotich, 30, a native of Kenya who is living in Atlanta, won his third marathon in the United States. He won in Green Bay, Wis., last year and won in Des Moines, Iowa, in 2008.
Like Wolski, Kiprotich led from the start until the finish line inside the University of Tennessee's Neyland Stadium.
"I was (running) with the winner of the half-marathon," said Kiprotich, who runs for a living and never went to college in the U.S. "When he got to the finish line, I went my way."
Kiprotich covered the 26.2-mile course in 2 hours, 23 minutes and 22 seconds.
Knoxville's Andy Baksa was second (2:23.58) ahead of Alan Horton of Knoxville (2:26.26), Michael Wardian of Arlington, Va., (2:29.28) and Stewart Ellington of Knoxville (2:29.33).
Ellington, who has been bothered by chronic sinus problems the past two weeks, was two-time defending champion.
"Much better than I anticipated," Ellington said of his race. "The past couple of weeks I haven't been feeling very good. I'm taking two weeks off starting today."
Ellington's time was within a second of his winning time of 2:29.01 last year.
"Even my time today was right around the time I was the last two years," Ellington said. "It shows you how deep the field was this year."
Baksa, a 2002 graduate of Farragut High School who ran for Belmont and UT, was running his first marathon.
It went better than Baksa expected.
"I was pumped," Baksa said. "I thought 2:25 on a good day, 2:26 I'd probably be happy, and I was a shade under 2:24. I exceeded all my time expectations and I felt really good and ran real patient. I was really, really pleased with how everything went."
Baksa's strategy was to run a slower pace early but be fast enough to stay in contention.
"I think I was two minutes behind the leader at the half-marathon and then started making up ground and got within 30 seconds of the leader," Baksa said. "I thought I had him with about three miles to go but I just couldn't change gears enough to roll him up."
Wolski's winning time was 3:02.11, which beat her time last year (3:03.20).
Erica Tedford of Maryville was second (3:06.54) and Tammy Slusser of Monroeville, Pa., was third (3:12.19).
The top women's marathoners finished shortly before heavy rains hit the area. By then, Wolski was savoring her victory.
"It's really nice to come out on top," she said.
Wolski knew she was gambling by taking the early lead and trying to hold it.
"Everybody knows that's taking a risk, she said. "I just felt like I needed to run on the edge and see what I had."
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