As he ran along the trail in the Way Too Cool 50K Saturday, Leor Pantilat felt the presence of his late father, who died several years ago from brain cancer.
So after crossing the finish line near the Cool Fire Station and recovering for a few minutes, he began sobbing and hugging his girlfriend.
"I lost him awhile ago, but he was there," said Pantilat, a 24-year-old San Carlos runner who won the men's title in 3 hours, 39 minutes, 51.8 seconds.
"His spirit was with me. … He was a runner. He inspired me to run."
Oakland's Caitlin Smith, 28, won the women's race with a 4:12:20.9 effort on a cool, breezy day in the foothills.
Pantilat said his father, Nathanel, ran for the Israeli national team, specializing in the 800 and 1,500 meters. On Saturday, Pantilat sensed his dad for a much longer distance.
"I felt him at numerous points," said Pantilat, who held off Dan Olmstead of Eugene, Ore. (3:42:58.6) to win his second 50K title.
Pantilat, an adventure runner, didn't start running ultras until last year, winning the Skyline Ridge Trail 50K in Palo Alto and placing second in the Skyline to the Sea 50K in Big Basin Redwoods State Park.
Coincidentally, Pantilat and Olmstead were both recently laid off from jobs.
Pantilat, a Stanford Law School graduate, lost his law-firm job in mid-January. He's looking for work and spending a lot of time on the trails.
"Probably why I ran so well today is I got laid off," he said. "It's a rough economy. I'm running now just to get through the days."
Pantilat took the lead 10 miles into the 31-mile race and built enough of a lead to win by more than three minutes.
"I felt like top five would be amazing," he said. "I've never run in a race with this many good people."
Olmstead, 36, finished third in the 2008 Cool race. He said he realized trying to catch Pantilat would be futile.
"I could tell he was pretty for real after halfway or so," said Olmstead, who lost his civil engineer job in the past week.
Smith, who has been doing shorter trail runs the last few years, is also a newcomer to the ultra scene.
She won the Sequoia 50K in Oakland, her first race at that distance, two weeks ago in 4:22:50 – more than an hour ahead of the second woman and less than 15 minutes behind the men's winner.
On Saturday, Smith ran with Red Bluff's Beverley Anderson-Abbs until Goat Hill, pulling away with about four miles left to beat Anderson-Abbs (4:17:15.3) by nearly five minutes.
"It was awesome," said Smith, a doula and a yoga/pilates instructor. "I'm just in love with being on the trails. It was beautiful, gorgeous."
The top three men's and women's finishers earned spots in the Western States Endurance Run, set for June 27-28. But Smith and Pantilat weren't in any hurry to commit to a 100-mile race.
"It makes me nervous to jump up that quick," Smith said.
Pantilat said he'd pass.
"Oh, no," he said. "Give it to the fourth-place guy. I don't want to run 100 miles."
Call The Bee's John Schumacher, (916) 326-5523.
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