Lucas wins at Nevada Day Classic

Ellen Lucas has been running the Carson Nugget Nevada Day Classic for longer than she cares to remember. The Gardnerville runner decided to try something different on Saturday and wound up with a new course record.

Lucas finished as the first woman overall in the 8-kilometer race and set a course masters women's record with a time of 32 minutes, 47 seconds. The time broke the old course standard of 33:19 set by Jackie Taylor in 1999.

Lucas already held the Classic record for the women's 2-mile with her 12:16 in 2001. She usually runs the 2-mile, but decided to go for the longer 4.97-mile distance this time.

"I can't remember the last time I ran the 8K. It was a long time, before they even had the option (of running 2 miles or 8K)," Lucas said.

She figures it had been at least 10 years. Maybe longer.

"I tried to go back and look up my time. I went back through three albums and still couldn't find it," said Lucas, who is also entered in a half-marathon relay race today in Folsom, Calif.

The Classic was held as a fund-raiser for Northern Nevada Special Olympics.

"We had a great turnout, great weather and great crowd support, which showed because we had a couple of records," race director Tim Tetz said. "We were excited about the way things turned out, especially since this is the No. 1 fund-raiser for Special Olympics."