Philly ING Distance Run

Last month I shot the Philadelphia ING Distance Run, a half-marathon, for the second time. This year I was a last-minute hire, so I didn't have time to plan out my shots as much as I would have liked, but I thought I'd share a few.

As wild, crazy and uncooperative as our weather in Philly has been this year, at least the weather was beautiful again this year for Philadelphia's premiere annual running event.

These were taken with Canon EOS 50D & EOS 5D Mark II cameras, along with Canon's 24-105 f/4L and 100-400 f/4-5.6 lenses and a Canon 580 EX II flash.

Ryan Hall, the American winner, ran an impressive race - to me at least - despite his commenting later that he had an "off day." Based on his personal best - he's the only American to ever run a 13-mile half marathon in under one hour - maybe this race wasn't close to his record, but finishing 13 miles in 1:01:52 is still pretty fast, to say the least. What's more, the California runner beat out a Beijing Olympic gold medalist and several Olympic silver medalists to take this year's race.

Kenya's Catherine Ndereba took first place for the women, winning the race for the seventh time. Yes, the seventh!

I loved the temporary tattoos - ING sure does market its brand very prominently and cleverly at this event every year.

Any woman who has enough disdain for an insurance company to have a t-shirt made is worthy of a picture and a smile, any day! I didn't ask for the background, but it's probably not a stretch to say it had something to do with healthcare - many shirts at the event reflected this, including some memorial shirts (see below).

The winners with their snazzy and hard-earned hardware - two classy, humble athletes who are definitely an inspiration.

To view more of my pictures from the ING Race, click Here.