Estremera and Fisher blaze to wins at Dewey Beach Liquors 5K
Races2run Director Wayne Kursh sent out a Saturday night blast to a few select members of the running community, alerting them that 31-year-old Ricardo Estremera would be running the Dewey Beach Liquors 5K July 9. He had a chance to break 15 minutes and win $50 in cash or a Wawa card, whatever Wayne could find in his wallet.
The buzz had reverberated and bounced around during pre-race warmups. Estremera, a college professor at Florida State, was easy to pick out, striding east and west on Dagsworthy Avenue as he warmed up. He was congenial and talked to people.
Ricardo’s street cred included a 4:09 mile on the road, a 1:09 half marathon and 30 flat 10K. A 3,000-meter steeplechaser in college at Albany University, Estremera often broke 60 seconds on his last lap.
The horn sounded and by the time one could spell separation, Ricardo was gone from The Ivy and hanging a left at Dewey Beach Liquors, leaving the field of 268 runners behind.
Rounding the turn heading for home 15 minutes later, race pacer Barbara Kursh pulled her bike to the side as Estremera was clocked in 15:23, a 4:58 pace, which is not too shabby running alone on an out-and-back course with lots of turns.
“The turns slow you down, and if someone was on my shoulder, I’d have run faster,” Estremera said before posing for a photo with Sen. Ernie Lopez, also with Puerto Rican kinship.
The race was crazy fast, with eight runners under 19 minutes, including Kayln Fisher from Mifflinburg, Pa., the female winner and sixth overall finisher in a time of 18:20.
Fisher just finished her junior year at Penn State. She is a former high school state champion in the 800 meters at 2:10 and ran a 4:54 indoor mile and ran on a 4-by-800 relay team in high school that clocked a time of 8:39 at the Penn Relays.
Joining Estremera atop the five-man leaderboard were William Rehrig in 16:47, Josh Breighner in 17:50, Derek Grayson in 18:10 and Aki Tsuchida in 18:17.
The women’s leaderboard was Fisher followed by Eve Hoffman in 20:25, Julie McCallum in 21:19, Cheryl Birmingham in 21:27 and Megan Lambert in 22:16.
The next Races2Run beach race is the 15th annual Dewey Beach Patrol 5K and 10K at the Ivy on Dagsworthy Avenue set for Saturday, July 22.
