PINKHAM NOTCH, N.H. — A Colorado man and woman have again won the Mount Washington Road Race.

Thirty-one-year-old Joe Gray of Colorado Springs defended his title on Saturday, completing the 7.6-mile climb to the summit of Mount Washington in 58 minutes and 15 seconds. That’s the second best time in the history of the race.

Thirty-one-year-old Kim Dobson of Grand Junction won the women’s title in 1 hour, 11 minutes and 39 seconds.

Organizers say this is the second year in a row and fourth time in the last five years that Colorado runners have won the men’s and women’s races.

An estimated 1,300 runners took part in the race, including 95-year-old George Etzweiler of State College, Penn., who finished the race in 3 hours and 28 minutes.

Gray won in dominating fashion.

The mountain-running standout from Colorado Springs crushed it in the 55th Northeast Delta Dental Mount Washington Road Race, setting an American record for the race on the way to a repeat title. His time of 58 minutes and 15 seconds was the second fastest in the history of the race.

Gray and Dobson, who made a triumphant return to the mountain, led another Colorado assault on New Hampshire and the grueling 7.6-mile, all-uphill Mt. Washington Auto Road course.

Both runners cruised to triumphs on a glorious, sun-splashed day on the highest peak in the Northeast. Temperatures were in the low 40s and climbing and there was not a lot of wind when the first runners reached the peak and finish line at about 10 a.m.

Gray finished nearly three minutes ahead of his nearest competitor, fellow Coloradan Andy Wacker, and had no one to push him for most of the race.

Dobson was almost four minutes in front of Brandy Erholtz, a two-time winner of the race.

“Joe left me at about the two-mile mark and after that it was almost like a time trial for both of us,” said Wacker, who was running his first Mount Washington Road Race. “It was incredible he was able to do that time running by himself.”

Jonathan Wyatt of New Zealand owns the course record of 56:41, set in 2004.

Gray was excited about his win and his time, but was hoping to take a shot at Wyatt’s mark, too.

“I wasn’t focused on my pace well enough to get the overall mark,” he said. “But I’m definitely very, very happy with the day. I’ve had an up and down season so far. I came back and wanted to defend my title and run a better time than last year.”

He did both – convincingly.

He’s the first repeat winner of the race since Simon Gutierrez of Colorado, who was sixth Saturday at age 49 in 1:04:02, won in 2002 and 2003.

After a series of runnerup and third-place finishes, Gray won his first Northeast Delta Dental Mount Washington Road Race last year in a time of 59:09. Gray is one of eight runners who has completed the race in under an hour, and the only one to do it twice.

Wacker, 26 of Boulder finished second in 1:00:59 and was well in front of Zach Miller, 26, of Manitou Springs in 1:03:15. Luca Cagnati, 25, of Italy was fourth in 1:03:40.

Dobson won this race in 2011 and 2012. She was entered for the first time since then. Dobson broke away early as well and finished in 1:11:39. Erholtz, who won the race in 2008 and 2009, finished in 1:15:34.

Dobson’s time fit between her winning times of 1:09:25 in 2009 and 1:12:11 in 2011.

“Some days you hit it right,” she said. “I remember in 2009 getting to the first mile and thinking it didn’t feel like a hill. Some days you feel spunky and some days you feel average. Today it felt like a hill. I guess it should.”

Laura Haefeli, 47 of Del Norte, who won the 2013 race, was third in 1:17. Katie Misuraca, 34, of Gloucester, Mass., was fourth in 1:17:37.

For the second year in a row and fourth time in the last five years, Colorado runners won both the men’s and women’s races. In addition, runners from Colorado swept the top three positions for both men and women Saturday. Colorado men grabbed six of the seven top spots in the race.

George Etzweiler of State College, Pa., was the final of 1,052 finishers in the race in 3:28:41. He’s 95 years old and was making a comeback. Etzweiler was unable to compete last year because of illness.

Justin Freeman, 38, of New Hampton was eighth overall in 1:05:55 and was the first finisher from New Hampshire for the third straight year and fourth time in the last five.

Freeman took nearly 30 seconds off his personal best mark in the race.

“It was a perfect day,” Freeman said. “I decided to run with no shirt. It was fairly warm at the bottom. There was a bit of a headwind near the top, but it was certainly not as windy as some years.”

Denise Sandahl, 34, of Bow was fifth overall in 1:18:42 in the women’s race for the second consecutive year and also repeated as the top New Hampshire woman. Sandahl was hoping to better her 1:17:21 of a year ago.

“My time was a little disappointing,” she said. “But I’ll take the fifth place and being the first from New Hampshire. I had fun. But it was painful fun.”

Hall of famers

As part of the day’s festivities, four runners – Eric Blake, Eleonora Mendonca of Massachusetts, Eric Morse of Vermont and the late Peter Watson of Massachusetts – were inducted into the Mount Washington Road Race Hall of Fame during the post-race celebration.

Blake of West Hartford, Conn., is the head men’s and women’s track & field/cross country coach at Central Connecticut State University and won the race in 2006, 2008 and 2013. He was excited about a chance to challenge Gray and the field again Saturday, but was a late scratch because of injury.

Mendonca, who is retired and living on Cape Cod, won the race three straight times from 1976-78; Morse has been among the Top 10 finishers in the race 14 times and three times has been the runnerup; and Watson, who died in 2012, ran Mount Washington 23 times from 1988-2011. He was the organizer of Team Gloucester, which regularly sends an impressive number of runners to the race.

The Northeast Delta Dental Mount Washington Road Race begins at the Auto Road base on Route 16 north of Pinkham Notch and climbs to the 6288-foot summit at an average grade of 12 percent and a net altitude gain of 4650 feet. The runners battle not only each other but the sheer force of gravity and Mt. Washington’s famously severe winds.

Former six-time World Mountain Champion Jonathan Wyatt of New Zealand holds the men’s course record at Mount Washington: 56 minutes 41 seconds, set in 2004. The women’s record was set in 2010 by the 23-year-old Ethiopian runner Shewarge Amare, who made the ascent in one hour eight minutes 21 seconds.

Northeast Delta Dental has sponsored the race up the historic Mt. Washington Auto Road since 2001. The dental insurance company, headquartered in Concord, N.H., with sales offices in Saco, Maine, and Burlington, Vt., provides dental benefits to more than 800,000 people in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, including individuals and families, and organizations of all sizes. Northeast Delta Dental’s President & CEO, Tom Raffio, has run the race in a personal best of 1:50:51. In 2012, Northeast Delta Dental increased its already strong support for the event, making it officially the Northeast Delta Dental Mount Washington Road Race.

Fifty-percent of all proceeds from the race will be donated to Coos County Family Health Services for their oral health programs. Based in nearby Berlin, N.H., this community-based organization provides innovative, personalized, comprehensive health care and social services to everyone, regardless of economic status.

COLORADO ATHLETES

Andy Wacker, Boulder CO M2529 1:00:59 2 1/54

Donna Garcia -Gutierrez, Colorado Springs CO F4044 1:40:33 52 5/51

Joseph Gray, Colorado Springs CO M3034 58:15 1 1/68

Simon Gutierrez, Colorado Springs CO M4549 1:04:02 6 1/107

Ashley Heguy, Colorado Springs CO F3539 1:53:26 117 20/54

Laura Kelecy, Colorado Springs CO F5054 1:32:20 25 3/40

Tom Kelecy, Colorado Springs CO M5559 1:26:59 88 4/76

Laura Haefeli, Del Norte CO F4549 1:17:00 3 1/55

Brandy Erholtz, Evergreen CO F3539 1:15:34 2 1/54

Kim Dobson, Grand Junction CO F3034 1:11:39 1 1/45

Peter Maksimow, Manitou Springs CO M3539 1:03:55 5 1/94

Zach Miller, Manitou Springs CO M2529 1:03:15 3 2/54

Rickey Gates, Woody Creek CO M3034 1:05:25 7 2/68