Dickie takes detour, but hangs on to win
By Mike Tymn
Special to The Advertiser
With less than a mile remaining in the second annual Hawaiian Half-Marathon yesterday morning, Bob Dickie had a lead of approximately 400 yards. Then, suddenly, the lead disappeared and it was a three-man race.
Entering Kapi'olani Park after descending Diamond Head Road, Dickie went right on Paki Avenue instead of turning left to head for the finish line on Kalakaua Avenue. By the time he realized his mistake and reversed directions, Farley Simon and Alex Hetherington had narrowed the gap to about 40 yards.
Dickie, a 27-year-old Hickam Air Force officer, hung on for a nine-second victory, finishing the 13.1-mile race in 1 hour, 13 minutes, 9.7 seconds.
"They had cones blocking the street (Kalakaua) and the police officer (escort vehicle) just kept going down (Paki), so I followed him," Dickie said. "I wasn't familiar with the course."
Simon, 46, outlegged Hetherington, 35, for the runner-up spot by three seconds, clocking 1:13:18.1.
Finishing 12th overall, Nina Christensen, a 27-year-old Hawai'i Pacific University junior from Denmark, won the women's race by nearly a mile while recording 1:24:35.9.
"I went out too fast," said Christensen, explaining that she had gone out at a 1:19 pace. "I should have known that I can't run that fast in this kind of humidity."
Jeannie Wokasch, 40, was second in 1:30.03.8, a little over a minute ahead of third-place Tammy Agader, 26.
More than 900 runners lined up at Ala Moana Beach Park for the 5:15 start of the race.
Katsushi Fuchiwaka, a visiting Japanese runner, set the pace for the first three miles before yielding to Dickie. "He looked like he was struggling a bit, and I threw a surge in on him at about three miles," said Dickie. "He didn't respond." Fuchiwaka finished fourth.
The course took the runners through Kapi'olani Park and around Kahala before returning to the finish line at Kapi'olani Park.
Dickie, a former University of Tennessee steeplechaser, reached 15K in 51:10, as Hetherington trailed by 50 seconds. Simon was another 17 seconds back.
"I thought I could run 1:09 today, but about halfway I realized that the humidity had really drained me and that I wouldn't be able to run that kind of time," said Dickie. "But I think I would have been in the 1:11s if I had not gone off course."
After realizing his mistake and reversing directions, Dickie did not see Simon and Hetherington bearing down upon him as he got back on course. Somewhat upset at the mistake, Dickie slowed, allowing Simon and Hetherington to narrow the gap to about 20 yards. Simon, Dickie's coach, then yelled to Dickie to wake up. Dickie responded and picked up the pace. "That was a class act on his part," said Dickie. "He could have gone right by me."
The women's race was for second as Wokasch pulled away from Agader and Suzan Burr with a little over a mile to go.
