The Greatest Dipsea Runners

#5, MELODY-ANNE SCHULTZ

Originally in the "Marin Independent Journal" of January 15, 2010

The question has been debated for decades during countless runs and over thousands of cups of coffee and mugs of beer: “Who are the greatest Dipsea runners of all time?” It’s a tough call. At least 15,000 different runners have competed in the 99 races. Seventy-seven of them own winner’s trophies, 82 earned a men’s or women’s Best Time award and 23 have been inducted into the Dipsea Hall of Fame.

Here’s my best shot at the answer, beginning with #5, and counting down, one a month, to the Centennial Dipsea this June 13.

My pick for #5 is Melody-Anne Schultz. Schultz not only won the Dipsea three times, all by staggering margins, and been among the top-three eight times in 10 career finishes, she has completely changed perceptions of what older women can achieve.

Schultz is a native of South Africa who excelled in sports but only took up running as a 46-year-old mother of three. She entered her first Dipsea in 1996, age 54. She never saw two runners starting well ahead of her, winner Joe King and runner-up Eve Pell, but neither did anyone pass her and she finished third. Melody’s actual time of one hour, five minutes, 57 seconds was the first of her Dipsea age records, with more set every other year she finished.

A year later, Melody started together with Shirley Matson, America’s #1 age-graded distance runner and now a four-time Dipsea champion. Schultz won the duel by more than two minutes, but was still overhauled by Sal Vasquez, finishing second with a sensational 1:02:39. (Schultz got revenge 13 days later, winning the 1997 DSE Double Dipsea, over Vasquez. She also won the Double in 2003 and 2004.)

In 1998, Schultz built a more than two-minute lead by the race high point of Cardiac. Even her nearest pursuer, Russ Kiernan, professed futility catching her, as she is a brilliant downhiller. But Schultz had not properly hydrated and collapsed on Insult, the last uphill, where medics carted her to Marin General.

She came back with a vengeance in 1999. Schultz took the lead in the second mile and ran utterly solo the rest of the way. Her winning margin of 5:24 was by far the largest since handicapping by age began in 1965, and third most in history. Her actual running time was an astonishing 1:01:51.

In 2000, Schultz ran 86 seconds swifter than Matson, but Matson had a three-minute head start advantage. So, at the tape, it was Matson first, Schultz second. An injury knocked Schultz back to 14^th in 2001.

The year 2002 was Schultz’s nightmare relived. Again she built a huge lead, again she collapsed at Insult, again she was first passed by Kiernan, again she was transported to Marin General. And again Schultz came back the following year with a stunner.

Running with, in her words, “wings on my feet,” Schultz, now 61, won by a mindboggling margin of 5:33. Just as sensational was her time, 1:03:36. It is rare for a man to “run his age,” a time in minutes equal or below his years. Dipsea Hall of Famers Norman Bright, Joe King, Russ Kiernan and Jack Kirk are among the few to have done it. Yet Schultz came close, something no other woman has ever even remotely approached. The time broke Matson’s over-60 women’s Dipsea record by more than four minutes.

In 2004, Schultz once more found herself outrunning Matson, this time by 2:20, and again unable to close all of Matson’s three-minute head start advantage. She finished third, passed late by Kiernan. Schultz was also third in 2005, trailing the winning Kiernan and Roy Rivers.

Motivated in 2006 to win “for my beloved mother, who had but a short time to live,” Schultz broke the tape a third time. Only Matson and Sal Vasquez have won more Dipseas. Shultz’s margin, 1:28 over Rivers, and her actual time, 1:09:03, are outstanding, modest only in comparison to her own previous efforts. Rivers, who would win in 2008, recently said, “Melody gives the Dipsea credibility. How would a world class runner fare in the Dipsea? She’s your answer. Every year, if she shows up in top form, she could win by three or four minutes.”

After sitting out 2007, Schultz returned in ’08 and finished fifth. She skipped last year as well. But this June 13, she gets her most head start minutes ever, and several pundits have installed her as early favorite to win.