THE BROOKS BLOG

Hansons-Brooks (powered by Saturn) athletes Mike Morgan, Chad Johnson and Ryan Sheehan will kick off the fall marathon season for the team this weekend at the USA Marathon Championships on Sunday in the Twin Cities.

Morgan brings a 2:15:11 personal best, from his debut at the 2006 Chicago Marathon. Since his debut in Chicago, he represented the USA with a 23rd place finish at the 2007 IAAF World Championships in Osaka–followed closely by a 12th place showing at the USA Olympic Marathon Trials in New York City last fall.

Teammate Chad Johnson leads the trio with a marathon best of 2:15:03, also from the 2006 Chicago Marathon. Johnson placed 20th in the USA Olympic Marathon Trials last fall, and placed 59th at the 2005 IAAF World Marathon Championships in Helsinki.

Making his marathon debut, Ryan Sheehan has the road racing credentials to place him on the short list of contenders with his more experienced teammates. Last fall, Sheehan ran 1:03:36 at the Dallas White Rock Half Marathon–the 13th fastest time in the country for 2007. He also placed 4th in the 2007 USA 20 km Championships (1:00:33).

Other top contenders that will be racing Sunday include 2004 Olympian and 2002 USA Marathon Champion Dan Browne (Beaverton, Oreg.), Fasil Bizuneh (Boulder, Colo.), and Justin Young (Superior, Colo.).

The men’s marathon championship, which is held in conjunction with the Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon, also serves as a qualifying race for the 2009 IAAF World Championships in Berlin–for two of the top-five finishers–and is also the first qualifier for the 2012 Olympic Trials for athletes who run under the new 2:19:00 qualifying standard.

The race gets underway at 9:00 a.m. EST. Race results and real-time runner tracking will be available at www.onlineraceresults.com.