Etka, Lipps trot to Turkey Day 2-mile titles

Etka, Lipps take Turkey Trot 2-miler titles
Runners hail from WV, MD, MI, VA and VT

* Complete results * Photos

ROMNEY, W.Va., Nov. 24, 2011 Eric Etka traveled a long way for a two-mile run.

He figured he might as well make the most of it.

Etka, 39, of Richmond, Va., beat out 21 other participants in Hampshire County's inaugural Turkey Trot 2-miler in Romney on Thursday morning. He stopped the clock in 11 minutes, 34.9 seconds -- nearly 48 seconds ahead of runner-up 14-year-old Lars Hallstrom - Eric's nephew.

Hallstrom, of Ann Arbor, Mich., finished in 12:22.9. The two were the rather fast part of a contingent of family members in town visiting Lynn Bohrer, who is spending her first Thanksgiving Day as superintendent at the West Virginia Schools for the Deaf and the Blind.

Contributions of cash and canned food items from participants will be donated to the SkillsUSA students at Hampshire High School. Those students are working on their canned food drive as a local chapter of a state group.

Finishing third overall was Jason Pannone, 35, of Cumberland. Behind Etka, Pannone, Hallstrom and Hampshire High School's Eli Lipps made up the chase pack for the first half of the out-and-back race along Foxes Hollow Road, just a few miles west of Romney. Pannone, still recovering a bit from his first foray into the world of ultrarunning - the Fire on the Mountain 50K trail run on Nov. 6 - took third in 12:27.8 while Lipps dropped back to fourth in 12:50.8.

Leonard Galvan, 53, of Romney, doubled up as the men's masters (40-49) and grandmasters (50-59) winner. He placed fifth overall in 14:08.9.

In the women's race, 11-year-old Hannah Lipps, a sixth grader at Romney Middle School, outlasted big sister Rachel. It seemed both were out for merely a casual stroll on a quiet country road through the first half of the run. They reached the midway point together before Hannah separated from Rachel in the second mile. Hannah finished in 14:06.5 while Rachel took second in 15:07.7.

Kirsten Hallstrom, 42, of Ann Arbor, Mich., took third overall and won the women's masters (40-and-over) title in 17:06.