Coming off a tough 5,000 meter Diamond League race on Thursday, Flagstaff-based runners Luis Grijalva and Adriaan Wildschutt turned around and competed in a 3,000-meter Diamond League race in Stockholm on Sunday, with Grijalva finishing third and Wildschutt sixth.
For Grijalva, the former NAU star and Guatemalan Olympian, it was the second straight impressive performance. In Oslo’s 5K, he set a big personal best of 12:50.58, and was in the mix Sunday in the Stockholm 3,000, running 7:33.96, a half a second behind winner Narve Nordas, who came from behind to run a speedy 53-second final lap.
For Hoka NAZ Elite’s Wildschutt, Sunday’s time of 7:36.77 was a personal best by a second and a half and broke his own South African national record.
In an interview with FloTrack after the race, Grijalva said he is on schedule to peak at the Olympics in Paris.
“Right now, it’s just getting back to home base (Flagstaff) and training 10 weeks and getting ready to be more specific in training situations and get faster over the last lap,” Grijalva told FloTrack. “Overall, it’s pretty good. We didn’t do too much in May, so we’re training upwards. I think I’m in a good spot.”
NAZ Elite posted a workout video of Wildschutt, pre-Oslo, on its YouTube channel.
In community racing, the Flagstaff Symphony Beethoven 5K on Saturday at Fort Tuthill County Park was won by Luke MacGowan in 21:05 and Anne Schreiber in 21:18. Full results here.
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