Looking through the Houston Marathon results this afternoon, I was struck by seeing a not-too-well known American, Stephanie Rothstein, placing in the top 5 and going sub-2:30.
Looks like she went through quite a bit over the last 3 years to get to this point:
http://racingnews.runnersworld.com/2010/09/a-brief-chat-with-stephanie-rothstein.html
Congrats to her and the McMillan team up in Flagstaff.