Many of the fastest women runners from all over the New York metropolitan area joined with runners from Long Island of all ages and abilities for the 26th annual Arrow Exterminating Company Long Island Women’s 5K Run, held on the roads of Farmingdale on Saturday morning, July 18 – and all of them enjoyed the picture-perfect weather that highlighted an almost picture-perfect event.
This year’s overall winner was Garden City’s own Katie Di Camillo, a standout athlete at Holy Trinity High School and Providence College, who absolutely destroyed a stellar field with a great finish of 17:10, a full 45 seconds in front of runner-up Christina De Rosa. Katie’s performance also earned her the Paula Wunderlich Memorial Award as the first member of the Greater Long Island Running Club to cross the finish line.
Also winning an award was Karen Pompey of Garden City, who finished in 13th place overall and won the second place award in the 35-39 age group with a time of 19:41.
This year’s run was once again conducted by the Greater Long Island in conjunction with the Town of Oyster Bay, with Jackie Grabin, Debby Tappan and all the other good folks at Arrow Exterminating coming on board as the returning title sponsor, with a big assist from Bob Cook and his great staff at The Runner’s Edge, who sponsored the Race Walk Division of the event again this year, the law firm of Mejias, Milgrim & Alvarado, P.C., and New York Sports Clubs.
Debbie Blair can take justifiable pride in having done an excellent job as director of the event in her rookie year, “Aunt” Amy Goldstein for handling the Little Women’s Fun Run, Carl Grossbard for coordinating volunteers, Fred von der Heydt for heading up course and finish line logistics and Terry Bisogno for doing another incredible job as the finish line and awards announcer.
The 2009 edition of the run was again part of the Grand Prix of Long Island Road Races, conducted under the auspices of Long Island Track & Field, and was the 2009 Long Island Track & Field Women’s Championship event.
The main event was preceded by a quarter-mile fun run for future female Olympians age 12 and under, with special Fun Run Medals presented to all Fun Run finishers.
The 2009 Run was once again geared to support the fight against gynecological cancers, with a substantial portion of the proceeds going to Long Island Oceans (Ovarian Cancer Education, Advocacy, Networking and Support) – bringing light to all GYN cancers – and (new this year) Island Harvest (fighting hunger, touching lives).
