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HONOLULU, Hawaii - Lois Ann Gilmore of Janesville, Wis., one of the most
successful and prolific age-graded masters distance runners in history
and a survivor of two life-threatening illnesses, on Thursday was named
USA Track & Field's Masters Athlete of the Year. The announcement was
made by the Masters Long Distance Running and Track & Field Committees
at USATF's Annual Meeting in Honolulu.
Gilmore, 77, has run 54 road races to date this year, at distances from
5 km to 15 km. Her accomplishments have included an American record time
of 26:01 for 5 km, which has been the distance at which she has found
the most success.
More than a decade ago, age-grade standards were established which
enabled the performances by athletes in different age groups to be
compared. Using the tables, performances at a given age are assigned a
percentile to indicate where it would rank on a scale of 1-100. Out of
Gilmore's 54 road races this year, a remarkable 35 of them are 90% or
above.Only one other woman in her age group achieved even one
performance of 90 percent or above. In other age groups, it was achieved
in the W50-59 age group by all runners only 27 times, and 20 times in
the 40-49 age group.
Gilmore's other top performances in 2007 were 43:01 for 8 km and 43:38
for 5 miles. Also in 2007, Gilmore won the W75 10,000m title at the USA
Masters Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Orono, Maine, where she
set a pending national record of 55:27.
"I am very proud and humbled by this award and recognition from USATF,"
Gilmore said. "I am very excited and feel so good about it."
"I have been Awards Chair for Masters LDR for the better part of 10
years and I have never seen the extraordinary number of outstanding
performances that Lois has accumulated this year," said USATF Masters
Long Distance Running Chair Don Lein, who also ranks masters runners for
Running Times magazine. "To call it unparalleled is an understatement.
To think she has done this after overcoming the two major causes of
death in the U.S., cancer and heart disease is mind-boggling. Truly,Lois
is sui generis."
Gilmore's accomplishments are made even more remarkable by the fact that
in many ways, she is lucky to be alive. She began running in 1989 as a
way of getting back in shape and overcoming the depression that followed
suffering from breast cancer. Her training paid off when she first was
nationally ranked (3rd) in 1997. She was top-ranked in 2001.
In 2002, while out on a run, Gilmore fell. She started walking and fell
again. She made it home but was diagnosed with a stroke that had
involved bleeding in her brain. At one point, she was given a 10 percent
chance of survival, but she has thrived. The only effect from her stroke
is a loss of peripheral vision that prevents her from driving.
Gilmore is enshrined in the Chicago Area Runners Association Hall of
Fame, having been its Runner of the Year 9 times.
About Masters track & field and long-distance running
Millions of Americans take part in masters long distance running or
track and field, with roughly 53 percent of all male and 40 percent of
female road-race finishers being over age 40. A celebration of fitness
and healthy living at any age, masters competition features men and
women over the age of 40, setting new standards for what is possible as
Americans age.
About USA Track & Field
USA Track & Field (USATF) is the National Governing Body for track and
field, long-distance running and race walking in the United States.
USATF encompasses the world's oldest organized sports, some of the
most-watched events of Olympic broadcasts, the #1 high school and junior
high school participatory sport and more than 30 million adult runners
in the United States. For more information on USATF, visit www.usatf.org.
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