COLLEY, KELATI PREVAIL AT COLD AND WET MANCHESTER ROAD RACE, by Lori Riley for Race Results Weekly, used with permission.

MANCHESTER, CONN. (28-Nov) -– Weini Kelati won her fourth straight Manchester Road Race here this morning, three years after her first run on the 4.737-mile course. She is now the only woman to win New England’s second largest road race four consecutive times.

Kelati, 27, an Olympian who lives and trains in Flagstaff, Ariz., won today’s 88th annual Thanksgiving Day race in 23:14, 19 seconds off her record she set in 2021.

Andrew Colley from the ZAP Endurance team in Blowing Rock, N.C. won the men’s race for the first time in 21:09 after finishing fourth in 2022 while running the fourth-fastest time in race history (21:07).

There were over 12,000 entrants but quite a few no-shows due to the rainy and cold weather with temperatures in the high 30s at race start and the crowd watching the race was also down this year.

Kelati led wire to wire, pacing off the men around her, as she has done in her three other victories.

“It feels great,” Kelati said. “This is my first race of the season. I took a break after the Olympics. I wasn’t sure what to expect but I know I was in really good shape.

“I was happy, with these conditions. I was hoping to run a little faster.”

Only Amy Rudolph, who won five times between 1995-2002, has more victories than Kelati at Manchester. Kelati is tied with Judi St. Hilaire, who won four times between 1985-92.

Annie Rodenfels of Newton, Mass., finished second (24:05) and Florencia Borelli of Argentina third (24:16).

Kelati had taken a break after the Olympics, where she finished eighth in the 10,000 meters, and went back to visit her family in Eritrea but her bags with her running gear never arrived so she took three extra weeks off.  It didn’t seem to bother her Thursday.

“It doesn’t take me a long time to get fit so I wasn’t worried about it,” she said.

The men’s pack took the first mile out in 4:28 and the group thinned out a bit as they tackled the Highland Street hill. After Kenyan Olympian Edwin Kurgat and Evert Silva finished in a dead heat at the King of the Hill mark (Kurgat was deemed the winner and awarded the $1,000 bonus), Colley came into play.

He took the lead down the Porter Street hill, citing his surfing background and how he wasn’t afraid to fall – “I just let gravity take me,” he…