Munoz, Bowman Get Best of Hills to Win Half Marathon

SAN DIEGO —  To passing motorists, it is nothing more than a slight upgrade. To a half marathoner, it might as well be Mt. Everest.

The hill on Sixth Avenue in downtown San Diego requires no more than a mild acceleration if you’re driving. On foot, the hill takes on a new personality, especially if you’ve already run 12 miles.

The last mile in Sunday’s America’s Finest City Half Marathon became: the Horrible, the Hellacious, the Hill.

Two runners it didn’t bother in the least were Mexico’s Rafael Munoz and San Dimas’ Kathy Bowman, who won the 14th running of the AFC Half Marathon on a balmy morning in Balboa Park.

In his first half marathon since he finished 13th here in 1989, Munoz, 27, won in 1 hour 4 minutes and 6 seconds. Munoz broke away from Mexico City’s Faustino Hernandez and Switzerland’s Danny Boltz on the Hill, right before he made the final turn onto El Prado--the gateway into the park and the finish line within sight.

Hernandez, now of Placentia, was second in 1:04.14 and Boltz, who trains in Albuquerque, N.M., took third in a time of 1:04.26. Imperial Beach’s Matt Clayton (1:04.48) and Santa Monica’s Danny Reed (1:04.54) ran with the early pack and broke away with Hernandez, Boltz and Munoz at the 10-mile mark, but didn’t go when the other three surged on Broadway, near the 11-mile mark.

And that’s where Bowman, 30, really got started. In the first major race of her career, she trailed long-distance specialist Nancy Ditz of Woodside almost the entire race before Bowman pulled away with less than a mile to go to win in 1:14.18. Ditz, 37, was far enough ahead to hang on for second, but she faded to a 1:15.17 finish. Sylviane Puntos of Canada (1:16.27) was third.

But about those hills . . .

Throughout the morning, race commentators on the radio warned listeners not to discount the last two miles of the race, where the hills could affect significantly the race’s outcome. They didn’t disappoint. That’s where Munoz and Bowman strutted their stuff. They didn’t just work the hills, they controlled them.

“I do lots of hills, lots of distance, lots of repeats,” Munoz said through an interpreter.

Munoz, whose goal is to represent Mexico’s Olympic team in 1992 in the 5,000 or 1,500 meters, lives in a town outside Mexico City called Tlaxcala, but he trains on the hills in Mexico City.

At least once a week, he goes on a 20-mile run that includes a steep 5 1/2-mile hill.

“I like the hills. That was my strategy,” he said.

Munoz is relatively new to distance racing and international competition--his first European meet was the March World Cross Championships in Belgium where he took 158th--and he didn’t know how to pace himself.

“I just went with the group and I was comfortable (with the pace) of the pack.”

After running with a pack of 16 through the first nine miles of the race, Munoz simply outlasted and out-kicked the runners who managed to stay in front. But once he made his final move, Hernandez and Boltz never attempted to go with him.

“I felt good, until the hills,” said Boltz, who is focusing on the marathon at the World Championships in Japan next month and put in his usual 120-mile training week instead of tapering for this race. “I just got tired. I didn’t have enough to go. There was nothing there.”

That’s how Ditz felt after Bowman literally caught and passed her as the race winded down.

“When Kathy went by, she went by. I didn’t respond,” said Ditz, who was so far in front that Bowman couldn’t even see Ditz until the 11th mile.

“She was definitely out in front. But I thought to myself, ‘All these second (places),’ ” said Bowman, who finished second to Ditz at a six-mile race in Santa Cruz last month.

“People were telling me I wasn’t that far behind her. So when she was only 20 yards ahead of me, that’s when I realized I was right there, and we had that steep hill,” she said.

That steep hill soothed Bowman, who trains regularly on hills in the San Gabriel Mountains.

“I just told myself that I could beat the hill.”

Bowman, a running veteran of 16 years, didn’t become a full-time runner until four months ago, after a victory at the Fontana Days Half Marathon in Mt. Baldy convinced her to concentrated on racing, rather than “race a race and go into hiding,” although she’s not sure what distance she likes.

Shouldn’t matter . . . as long at there are hills.

Race Notes

Both Munoz’ and Bowman’s winning times were well off the marks of 1:02.55. set by Kirk Pfeffer in 1981 and 1:11.31, set by Sylvia Mosqueda in 1988. But they were good enough to pick up the $2,000 victory check.