Jeff Campbell grabbed his 7th ATM race victory - joining Hisashi Kitamura again as male record holder - in a very hot and humid edition of Sierra Madre Trail 75, one month before he runs the World Championship race for his team Canada. Initially joined by home favourite Elmer Retolado, winner at Santa Ines earlier this season, Campbell shifted to a higher gear after a small stumble in a river and quickly produced a gap of 30 minutes on the rest by km 20. Retolado was already fading away, suffering from a knee injury sustained just two weeks ago. It was the young John Ivan Zonio, cousin of Jeffery and making his ATM debut, who very quickly emerged as the main challenger for second place. Zonio even managed to keep more or less an even pace with Campbell in the middle part of the race. Even though it was only 8 am, temperatures had already risen above 30 degrees and dehydration was beginning to plague plenty of runners. Another newcomer, Ariehmar Bardoquillo, ran himself into the mix for a podium finish, along with Maynard Encornal. Retolado continued to lose terrain and would eventually DNF, struck by heat and dehydration along with his knee problems. A race to forget for the young and talented Retolado, who will hopefully take time to allow his knee to heal properly. Despite being safely in the lead, Campbell suddenly remembered the course record set by Larry Apolinario last year and upped his pace again. He would take the course record by a handful of minutes, but probably regretted going for it as - clearly overheating - he was desperate for ice as he crossed the finish line without any celebrations. An hour later, a visibly fatigued Campbell stated it had been his “hottest race ever”.

John Ivan Zonio held on to a great 2nd place, ahead of Maynard Encormal, who really got going in the second part of the race. It’s Encornal’s second third place podium finish of the season. In fourth place came Ariehmar Bardoquillo, Anthony Calixterio was fifth and Singapore's Deric Lau sixth.

The women’s race developed into a tight battle between Manila’s Ann Jilian Pulanco and Penang-based American Danielle Perry. Pulanco is known as an ultra endurance specialist, but has recently changed her training regime to also include more speed work. It paid off. She took the lead quite early into the race, but Perry would always stay close. Halfway, the American caught up with Pulanco and even dropped her to lead the race for nearly 10 km. However, Pulanco did not drop her guard and fought back bravely. In the end, she even won - her first ATM race victory - by over 50 minutes as Perry had no energy left to stick with her. On the basis of her performance in Sierra Madre, we should expect Pulanco to feature up front in next month’s Borneo Miler as well. Points leader Irish Glorioso never found herself in podium contention, but revealed that she has been slowing down her training after her blitz-start of this season. Her main goals come towards the end of the year. Instead, it was great to see Melanie Hingpit back on the podium in third place. A former winner of the Mt Apo Sky Race, Hingpit was ten minutes faster than Mary Joy Sumanda and Sarawak’s Siet Fah Lim - winner of Borneo TMBT 100 last year, but seemingly less in her element in the Rizal mountains.

The Sierra Madre Trail Ultra turned out to be a great newcomer in our ATM Championship series, with start/finish in Sitio Wawa, the heart of Manila’s trail community. All weekend, a pleasant party atmosphere was never away, and foreign participants had a great time mixing with all the enthusiastic local runners and people. The heat during this edition proved a little too much for some, but as the cliché goes “you can never book the weather”.

The next Filipino points race is MUSPO Ultra 100 on 22/23 July.

Campbell & Pulanco grab victory in sweltering Sierra Madre