Evan Gaynor, Grace Driskill, Nick Wheeler and Sina Sontowski are not from New Mexico originally, but they live here now.
Sunday, these four New Mexico transplants were winners at Sunday’s Duke City Marathon.
Gaynor, an Ohioan who lives in Santa Fe, was the men’s half-marathon champion, followed to the finish line in the 13.1-mile race by Driskill, an Arizona native and the first-place women’s finisher.
Wheeler (no relation to the UNM football safety of the same name) is from Maine. He won the men’s 10k title.
Sontowski, a native of Hanover, Germany, was the first woman across the finish line in the 5k run.
The four runners, all interviewed by the Journal on Sunday, did not appear in Monday’s Duke City Marathon story because of some irregularities — since resolved — in race results as provided by chronotrack.com.
Gaynor, Driskill and Wheeler are all accomplished runners, having competed in college and beyond. For Sontowski, running is purely recreational — an activity she rediscovered just seven months ago after a 13-year hiatus.
Sontowski, 30, who works in cybersecurity, said she didn’t expect to be the first woman finisher in the 5K. She was,in a time of 23 minutes, nine seconds.
“It was so good coming back (to running),” she said. “The community here is amazing.”
Two decades ago, Gaynor was an Ohio state cross-country and track champion for Delta High School near his hometown of Toledo. He then ran for Malone University in Canton.
Gaynor moved to New Mexico some two years ago and has a running store in Santa Fe. He’s a running coach and a personal trainer.
“I’d been out here briefly in 2014 and just fell in love with the place,” he said. “In my opinion, New Mexico is the best place to be a runner that there is.”
On Sunday, Gaynor covered the 13.1 miles in 1:12:43, almost six minutes ahead of second-place finisher Steven West.
Driskill, the women’s half-marathon winner, was a state champion on the track at Rincon High School in Tucson, Arizona. She competed in track and cross country at Arizona and Georgia Tech before moving to Albuquerque for work — she’s a software engineer — a year-and-a-half ago.
Driskill finished Sunday’s half-marathon, her first race at that distance, in 1:22.01, fourth overall and more than five minutes ahead of No. 2 women’s finisher Shantel Lowe.
Running is mostly for fun now — “serious recreation” — Driskill said, but “I was pushing myself, definitely. The last three miles, four miles, were really hard. But it was good.”
Wheeler, the men’s 10k winner, ran track and cross country with his twin brother, Curtis, at Southern Maine University.
He ran the Boston Marathon (2:33:30) in 2012.
Wheeler, 40, moved to Albuquerque some seven years ago for work, and he said, the weather.
“My wife and I really enjoy Albuquerque, the sunshine,” he said. “A little bit warmer than New England.”
Wheeler won Sunday’s 10k in 33:17. Women’s winner Ashley Holt of Flagstaff, Arizona was second overall in 34:21, followed by Albuquerque’s Philip Keller in 34:47.