12-year-old girl runs half marathon by mistake

A 12-year-old western New York girl has run a half marathon by mistake, completing 16 extra kilometres after she got into the wrong road race.

LeeAdianez Rodriguez had registered for the five kilometre race that was part of last Sunday's Rochester Regional Health Flower City Challenge. She thought she was arriving late at the starting line when the race started, so she began running with the rest of the runners.

It turned out she was running with the half-marathoners on the 21km course and not in the 5km. Rodriguez says she realised about halfway through that she was in the wrong race but decided to finish.

She completed the half-marathon in 2:43:31.

Her mother became worried when she wasn't among the finishers of the 5km, but they were reunited when she finished the half-marathon.