The Sunset district's own Shannon Rowbury is officially kinda, sorta "the fastest woman alive"! The freckly, superadorable 23-year-old Sacred Heart alum recorded the fastest qualifying time of all runners in this year's 1,500-meter olympic qualifying trials. Take that, Kenya! She ran her first her first preliminary heats yesterday morning, and will run for the gold on Saturday.

Should she win, she'll join Ben Wildman-Tobriner as the only actual, current San Francisco residents to win gold at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. You can congratulate her when you see her running in Golden Gate Park. You can also indulge your ShannonMania by reading her SFGate blog or checking out her web page. If you are a splosh or messy-food fetishist, you'll be particularly interested in the photo of her in a tiny bikini top with cake smeared all over her face.