Grandma's Marathon winners: Christopher Raabe and Mary Akor

by Amy Judd | June 20, 2009 at 08:12 am

1386 views | 6 Recommendations | 0 comments

The 2009 Grandma's Marathon is now over and two American's, Christopher Raabe and Mary Akor have won for the men and the women. This was the 33rd Grandma's Marathon in Duluth.

Christopher was the first American to win the men's race in 14 years, and the first person from Minnesota since 1982.

Raabe, a native of Sauk Rapids who ran cross country at North Dakota State, finished in 2 hours, 15 minutes, 13 seconds. The last American man to win Grandma’s was Mark Curp in 1995, and the last Minnesota man to win was Rush City’s Dick Beardsley in 1981 and 1982.

This was the third consecutive win for Mary Akor and she had a time of 2:36:51.

In the Garry Bjorklund Half Marathon, Ernest Kebenei of Kenya won for the men and Belainesh Gebre of Ethiopia won for the women.

The Grandma's Marathon is an annual race in Duluth, Minnesota and is named as such because when it started in 1977, the local 'Grandma's Restaurant' was the only business in Duluth that would sponsor the event.
It is now run by over 10,000 people evey year.