AN hour-long torrential downpour the likes of which many seasoned athletes had never before seen straddled the start of the fifth annual IMG Miami Marathon.But it did not put off three intrepid runners from Bermuda.

However, their act of bravery as they stood on the pre-dawn start line getting drenched in puddles of rain inches deep was overshadowed by a fourth runner from the island who won his age group in a beach-front 5K race the day before.

Ricky Sousa Jr. was the pick of the quartet as he won the 15-19 age group in the 3.1 mile race that was benefiting the Community Partnership for the Homeless.

The 16-year-old used the event as base-fitness training for the upcoming cycling season — a sport at which he has already made a name for himself having won last year’s May 24 Sinclair Packwood Race and becoming the youngest winner at just 15.

In the Tropical 5K, which had more amenable weather conditions than the marathon, he ran 19 minutes 25 seconds at Miami Beach.

His father Ricky Sousa had hoped to compete in the main marathon, but although he travelled to Florida he watched from the sidelines having been diagnosed with a stress fracture a week earlier.

That left Geoff Blee and St. David’s Zina Francis as the only two Bermuda runners in the main marathon field of 2,521 finishers. Another runner Lynn Patchett opted to run the half-marathon distance and accompanied Blee for the opening two miles before the pair became separated.

But it was the frightening weather conditions that proved the talking point as some 9,000 competitors headed out at 6 a.m. in monsoon-like conditions.

So bad was the rain that eventual third-placed Kenyan Charles Kamindo took his running shoes off at 10 miles because they were causing him to slip on the metal bridge sections on the course. He ran the remainder of the race — a further 16 miles — wearing only a pair of yellow socks on his feet.

Blee had hoped to have company in Miami, but when May 24 legend Kavin Smith pulled out with injury a week before and then Sousa was also sidelined, Blee joked he would at least most likely be first Bermudian to finish with both highly rated rivals out of the picture.

It may have been the adverse weather (the rain stopped after the runners had been out for two or three miles), the high humidity and heat (between 68-75F) or the lack of any pressure to drive on through the pain barrier that prevented Blee achieving his target of another sub-three hour marathon.

Last year he set a personal best of 2:57 in Chicago. But on Sunday he ended up with a time of 3:10:07, commendable enough to earn him 45th place overall and seventh in the Masters’ age category, but the 41-year-old intends to strengthen up for a crack at the famous Boston Marathon in April.

He said: “At the start it was pounding down with rain and I was standing in a puddle of two or three inches of water. It was breezy and humid.

“I went through halfway in 1:29:40 and that didn’t feel easy so I knew it was going to be a long day.”

Feeling twinges in a hamstring muscle and a pain on his right-side, he admits having to stop to walk at a few points.

“I was racing against myself and I kept saying I can’t quit. My time wasn’t horrible but personally it’s not a good result for me.”

Miami was his 12th marathon finish. Further down the field Zina Francis, 44, finished in 5:36:07, just outside the first 2,000 places.

In the half-marathon Lynn Patchett, like Blee, found the conditions far from favourable and having gone through the first 10K in 44:21 minutes slowed to a 1:36:37 finish, although that was good enough for sixth in her age group and 182nd overall from a field of 6,509 finishers.

Patchett, 39, a seasoned road runner, said she questioned her sanity in actually starting the race in such terrible weather. She is now embarking on an 10-week programme build up towards the Boston Marathon.

The Miami Marathon was won by Ethiopia’s Teshome Gelana in 2:17:51, the first woman home was 45-year-old Russian Ramilla Burangolova in 2:40:22.

In the half marathon the winners were Jared Nyamboki in 1:07:09 and Sonja Friend in 1:19:25.

[obox] The annual Butterfield and Vallis 5K road race and walk, generally considered to be the third biggest single road race on the island after May 24 Marathon Derby and the PartnerRe 5K in terms of participants, goes under starter’s orders this Sunday morning from the junction of Serpentine Road and Par-La-Ville Road. A junior race over 2.7K will be held shortly before the adults’ race. Late entries can be made today and tomorrow with entry forms available at the usual locations, including Sports Seller in Washington Mall. No entries will be accepted on race day.