By Brett R. Crossley
MIFFLINBURG -- With a cool breeze blowing, runners took to the starting line at Mifflinburg Park's Auxiliary Little Field and patiently waited for Don Bowman to give Mifflinburg's No. 15 police car the signal to start.
Once the Dodge Charger started rolling with its lights flashing, the more than 500 runners burst from the starting line and up the road to begin the 26th annual Mifflinburg 5K run Saturday.
A little more than 15 minutes later, Chris Spooner crossed the finish line with fans cheering. Spooner completed the race in near record time, with a mark of 15 minutes, 19 seconds.
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"This was my fastest time on this course," Spooner said of his finish. "Running in high school and college and now graduating, I wasn't expecting to run faster. I felt good through the first mile and charged up the hill hoping to get a big enough lead to hold. I tried to charge up the hill and recover on the downhill. I'm moving up in distance with doing more road races. I like it."
Spooner, a Lewisburg High School graduate and a former PIAA distance gold-medal winner, returned to celebrate his mom's birthday, and after she informed him that he was signed up for the race, decided to run.
"I came back for the Fourth of the July weekend and my mom's birthday," Spooner, 24, said. "She is so used to me running this when I'm home. When she said she signed me up I said, I'll do it.' Coming back to this race, which I ran every year in high school, is a good reminder of my accomplishments."
On the women's side of the race, Millville resident Katie Sick, 17, took the top honors as she was able to sprint away from a small crowd at the finish to be the first woman to cross the line, in a time of 19 minutes, 32 seconds.
"I'm more of a distance person," Sick said of her finish. "I'm not a strong sprinter and I came down with three women, so I actually beat someone sprinting. At the first mile there was a group of women ahead of me and I tried to stay with them. In the final mile, three of us came together and it was a sprint to the end."
As the race came to a conclusion, the grassy area next to the finish filled with runners and family members catching up and cooling off.
"I love coming back home," Spooner said of the day. "It's great seeing all my high school teammates and people I ran against. It's good to compete with them again and see them all. We all put so much time into this, it's good to see people go out for a fun' 5K run. It's good to enjoy it with people."
