The streets of Salem were buzzing with runners last Saturday morning as the 6th annual Salem Half Marathon returned after a year of “virtual” running due to the pandemic. Twins Jared and Jacob Coccia of Roanoke finished one-two in the half marathon about 20 one-hundreths of a second apart according to their chip times. Jared finished in 1:18:52.39 and Jacob’s chip time was 1:18:52.63. Jacob can be seen at the right in bib number 163 and Jared’s head is visable between 8K runners Alex Parkins (bib 729) and Nate Michener (bib 714) as the runners come up Main Street at the start of the race. Salem’s Parkins won the 8K in 28:14.74 and Michener was second at 29:49.69. The women’s half marathon winner was Kristin Garri of Washington, DC with a time of 1:31:57.1 and the first 8K woman was Alyssa Vassallo of Roanoke in 30:58.55. Salem runners in the top 20 overall in the half marathon included Matthew Johnson in sixth place, Davis Norman in 11th and Aaron Cook in 15th. In the 8K Salem runners in the top 20 were Parkins in first, Carson Tucker in fifth, Austin Prosser in seventh, Derek Batey in ninth, Savanna Dyer in 11th, Chris Tucker in 15th and Patrick Pelletier in 18th. More photos on page xx.
