Northpinellas: Yeager's return to racing runs through his mind

Victor and Sabine Yeager were on the deck at Clearwater Beach's Palm Pavilion drinking beer one night when they were surprised to see a horde of runners racing along the coastline.

A former high school and college runner, Victor Yeager's curiosity was aroused. He and his wife strolled over to the finish area at Pier 60 and inquired about the event. Yeager walked away with an entry form, which served as food for thought.

Three years later and 30 pounds lighter, Yeager is a hardcore member of the group -- the West Florida Y Runners Club -- and one of the bay area's top performers in the masters division (40-plus). In the recently concluded Sunsets at Pier 60 series, Yeager won the 40-44 age division all five times, finishing from sixth overall to 13th. Because of the vagaries of the tide, his times ranged from 18 minutes flat in the second race to 18:46 in the final event, Aug. 3.

"Seeing the runners that night three years ago got me back into running," said Yeager, a 4:28 St. Louis high school miler and the No. 1 runner on his cross country team at the University of Dallas as a freshman and sophomore.

"I wanted to try to get back into shape and see what I could do in the sport again -- what kind of times I could get," he said.

Without any serious speed training, the 6-foot-3, 175-pound Yeager has lowered his 5K time to 17:35. He placed 28th in last year's Turkey Trot 10K with a 37:33 performance and logged a 59:46 in Gasparilla in February to finish 107th overall and as the third masters from Pinellas.

"I'm still way behind a few area runners in my age division, such as Jeff Delie (Palm Harbor), who's really fast," Yeager said. "I just hope that I'll improve if I run longer and start doing speed work."

Yeager entered last December's Hops Marathon in Tampa although he said he wasn't in marathon shape.

"I approached it very cautiously," said the computer programmer with Nielsen Media Research in Palm Harbor. "I fell in with a slower group and stayed there a long time, which enabled me to run a negative split (running the second half faster than the first).

"Under the circumstances, my 3:28 wasn't that bad. I'm thinking of doing the half marathon there this year."

Next on Yeager's schedule is the Summer Sizzler 5K on Aug. 26 at Philippe Park in Safety Harbor, where he's apt to fall in with the only masters runner who beat him consistently in the beach series -- 42-year-old Judy Maguire of Clearwater.

"She's a good pacer for me," Yeager said. "I just try to stay with her. But in the beach series, she beat me four of five times. Last year at this time, I was chasing Donna Nesslar, so I guess I'm improving."

BEACH WRAP-UP: Maguire won the women's division of all five races to take the title with a maximum of 100 points.

Christa Benton placed second. She was followed by Gulfport's Karen Alexeev, who swept the 45-49 age division running barefoot.

University of Florida sophomore Andrew McSwain was the top point-getter among men after a runner-up finish to Rikki Hacker of Riverview in the final event.

McSwain totaled 86 points, just two ahead of Steve Wilcox of St. Petersburg. Hacker won four races to earn a maximum 80 points, but missing one event cost him the title.

NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS: In last month's USATF National Masters Track and Field Championships in Baton Rouge, La., Vanessa Hillard of St. Petersburg came away with three age-group gold medals and one silver.

Competing in the 60-64 division, Hillard won the shot put, hammer and discus events and placed second in the javelin.

Rob Light, a personal trainer from Clearwater, won the pentathlon in the 35-39 class and outscored the two 30-34 men who competed against him.

Light accumulated 2,760 points in the five events, winning the long jump, discus and the 200 in 24.6 seconds. His gold-medal performance was an improvement from his bronze in the meet last year after overcoming surgery.

Ethel Lehmann of Largo was a big winner in the National Seniors Sports competition in Boca Raton last month.

She captured gold medals in the 70-74 age division in the 100-, 200- and 400-meter events, as well as the long jump. Lehmann won a silver medal in the javelin, and her softball team, Freedom Square, won all six games to take the gold medal. Lehmann played first base.

Ann Riedelberger of St. Petersburg earned fifth-place ribbons in the 100- and 200-meter dashes, plus a gold as a member of the Freedom Square softball squad.

WORLD T&F CHAMPIONSHIPS: In the Armadillo Run 10K last March in Oldsmar, Tony Teats of East Lake duked it out with 1996 Olympian Paul McMullen of Michigan.

Teats prevailed over the national-class miler by 50 seconds.

Last week in Edmonton, McMullen advanced to the finals in his specialty -- the 1,500-meter event. He placed eighth (3:39.35) behind world record-holder Hicham El Guerrouj of Morocco.

Two other locally-connected runners, winners of the Holiday Classic in Clearwater, didn't fare as well.

Mark Carroll of Providence, who runs for Ireland, and former Tampa Bay Downs groom Ronnie Holassie of Miami, who competes for Trinidad and Tobago, gave it their best shot.

Carroll ran his heat in the 5K in 13:37, the 16th best time. The top 15 advanced to the final.

Holassie, a 1996 and 2000 Olympic marathoner, led the marathon field through the 15K mark in 47:01 and the 20K in 1:03:27 before dropping out with an injury.

The top U.S. man in the marathon, Josh Cox, clocked in at 2:26:52 for 35th place. The women's winner, Lidia Simon of Romania, had a better time, 2:26:01.

Former Brooksville resident Teresa Vaill, a two-time national champion race-walker, was disqualified in the World Championship trials in June in Eugene, Ore. Tampa's Tony Dees, the silver medalist in the 110-meter hurdles of the 1992 Olympics, recently was suspended two years for a positive steroid test.

FINISH LINES: The Disney Marathon is accepting applications for Florida's Finest, an elite few for the January event who receive a comp entry, hotel accommodations and meals for two.

Send a running resume, including details of 1999-2001 marathons and career highlights, to Lorraine Evans, or fax the information to (407) 351-0191. Questions? Call (407) 352-9131. The deadline is Sept. 21.

Russ Gerbers will defend his Twilight 5K title on the USF campus Friday night. He won last year in 14:46.

Nicole McCarthy captured the women's championship in 17:42.

The race starts at 8 p.m.

Runners can register online for the Race For The Cure 5K, Sept. 22 in St. Petersburg, at www.komentampabay.com.

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