BLOOMINGTON - Chris Zook and Stephanie Brown will run with more than 10,000 others in the 35th Bix 7 at Davenport, Iowa on July 25.

They tuned up for that prestigious road race by winning their respective divisions in the 25th Park 2 Park 5-miler, which saw 538 finishers brave a steady rain Saturday.

Zook, a 21-year-old Normal Community High School graduate, toured the course from Bloomington's Miller Park to Normal's Fairview Park in 25 minutes, 46.0 seconds.

His time ties the fifth fastest in the event's history and put him well under his winning time of 26:19 from 2007.

"I'm in a lot better shape than I realized," said Zook, who hopes to become an NCAA Division III All-American in his upcoming senior cross country season at Augustana College.

Zook opened with a 5:30 first mile and then averaged 5:06.3 the next four.

"That's what 75 to 80 miles (of training) a week will do I suppose," said Zook, who was running scared even though he finished well ahead of runner-up Jesse Holliger (27:05.3) and third-placer Jonny Kaufmann (27:12.7).

"I knew if I relaxed too much, I'd get caught by a bunch of guys from West."

Holliger, a 2008 Normal West graduate along with Kaufmann, has been training for the Southern Illinois-Edwardsville cross country season.

"I've been increasing my mileage little by little," Holliger said. "(Zook) ran really good. I saw him take off and I said 'there is no way I'm going to be able to hang with him.' So I just stuck behind Jonny and that helped me out a little bit."

Brown, who won the 2007 Park 2 Park in 29:45, posted the 11th best women's time in course history at 30:23.7.

"It was a lot of fun," said the 18-year-old University of Arkansas freshman-to-be, who won five state track titles for Tri-Valley High School.

"I wasn't too worried about running super fast today. I thought maybe I had a chance to break my fastest time on the course, but it didn't happen. That's OK."

Brown ran 6:00 the first mile and held her pace well enough to average 6:04.7 for the entire distance.

"I was ready to kick if any females came by, but I didn't feel like straining myself," said Brown, who finished 1:08.8 ahead of runner-up Nikki Domico of Bloomington.

The Masters (age 40 and over) winners were Mike Heffron of El Paso (27:21.7), who was fourth overall, and Debra Lowell of Ellsworth (35:19.8), who was 10th among women.

The race doubled as a family reunion and birthday party for relatives of Normal's Lanny and Annette Lobdell.

"It's my brother-in-law's 60th birthday so my sister decided we would have his celebration at my house in Normal," said Lanny, 67, who placed second in his age group (42:08.2) while Annette, 66, ran third in her division (50:54.0).

Of the 13 family members from as far away as England, Zambia, California, Nevada and Texas, 10 raced led by Normal's Eli Winn, who took fifth in the women's 30-34 age group in 40:24.4. Birthday boy Reid Dolly sped 52:14.2.