Berkeley Runner a Top Finisher in Bay to Breakers

graduate student David Yu placed 40^th in yesterday’s Zazzle Bay to Breakers race, with a finishing time of 39:39. The race celebrated its centennial with over 42,000 runners crossing the finish line.

Yu, 23, is a graduate student in the physics department and a member of the Strawberry Canyon Track Club.

Runners hit the city streets at 7 a.m. by San Francisco Bay and finished at Ocean Beach on the western end of Golden Gate Park, race officials said.

Yu shared this account of the race in an email:

"It was a ton of fun. It went much better than I'd expected, since I had to sit out two of the last three weeks with an Achilles injury. I ran the first two miles with the Asics Aggie centipede, then lost contact when we climbed up Hayes Hill (which seemed to go on forever!). The mile splits were pretty telling: 4:56, 5:03, 6:00. After the flat bit on the Panhandle, the course gives you a downhill right where you want it, around mile 5 in Golden Gate Park, so my competitors and I were able to speed back up to near 5-minute pace towards the end. When we turned onto the final stretch on the Great Highway, the wind blasted us right in the face, so nobody gave much of a kick."

Commemorating "100 Years Running," runners came from all over the world to participate. The first place finisher Ridouane Harroufi, 29, from Morocco, ran the 7.46-mile race in 34 minutes 26 seconds, race officials said.

For more race results, go to https://cdn.bazumedia.com/iframe/b2b2011-results.html.

This article was updated at 9:00pm. Bay City News Service contributed to this story.

Have photos of the race to share? A race story of your own? Tell us in the comments.