Pace Setter : January 2025

Another Successful Just Run Program Concluded in 2024 By Ken Skinner, Just Run Coordinator

Over 1800 elementary school children from the 35 participating schools concluded a very successful spring season with two track meets on June 5th and June 10th held at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy, NY.  About 1400 of the 1800 students attended both track meets which made for a very jam-packed 3 1/2 hours of activity each day beginning at 3 pm.  The total number of participating schools and students set a record for the Just Run spring program which was started in 2010 by the Hudson Mohawk Road Runners Club.  

That first track meet was held at Union College with 7 or 8 schools participating.  We quickly outgrew the facility at Union primarily due to the numbers of parents , grandparents and others wanting to watch the students compete causing Union officials, after a few years, to suggest we move to another location due to lack of parking for the spectators at Union.  From Union we moved to Guilderland high school then Mohonasen high school in Rotterdam then this year to HVCC.  The latter 3 facilities all have 8 lane tracks which we needed as our numbers grew.  We had to move out of Guilderland, and then Mohonasen this year, due to the tracks being refurbished.  After a couple of anxious weeks in April trying to locate another facility, we settled on HVCC.  In general, the HVCC facility was perfect and the facility personnel were extremely accommodating in meeting our needs.  We are thinking of returning there next spring.

The long range planning committee of HMRRC back in 2009 and 2010 was working on ways the club could give back to the community by funding a variety of projects which focused on running-connected activities.  The Just Run program which the committee recommended the club develop became a part of the national award-winning Just Run program based in Monterey, California started in 2005 and financially supported by the Big Sur International Marathon Foundation.  The national program focused primarily on California-based school Just Run programs but recognized programs based in other states as well including ours.  With the advent of COVID in 2020, the Big Sur Foundation shut down funding for its program since it could not conduct the marathon which financially supported Just Run.  We did the same thing.  Our program re-opened in the fall of 2021 but, to date, the Big Sur program is still shut down.  We were able to re-open due to our success in receiving grants for the past few years to support our program.  Our Just Run program, which includes a fall cross country program, costs between $35, 000 and $40,000 per year.  In addition to any future grants the program might receive, the club will support the program through income received from our major club races- the CDPHP Workforce Team Challenge, the fall Marathon and Half-Marathons and the Stockade-athon.

Now, back to our current spring Just Run program.  Registration begins in February and March each year with the goal of each participating elementary school starting their indoor/outdoor weekly training sessions the first week in April leading up to the track meets in June.  Each participating elementary school must appoint a school leader for the program and conduct the weekly training sessions as an after-school activity a minimum of one hour once a week.  Practically all of the leaders are teachers employed by the participating school.  At our track meets in June, there are 5 running events conducted (1500m, 800m, 400m, 200m and 100m) and no field events so the school leaders will conduct training sessions only focused on these running events.  If the weather cooperates, most schools should be able to hold about 8 weekly sessions leading up to the Memorial Day week.

This year, the schools participating in the spring program are a range of sizes and locations from urban to suburban to rural including regular public schools, charter schools and private and religiously-affiliated schools.  They come to the meets from as far away as Taconic Hills elementary school in the southwestern corner of Columbia County to Mayfield elementary school in the foothills of the Adirondacks.  Eight schools are from rural areas, nine schools from suburban areas and eighteen schools from urban areas.  When the schools first arrive at HVCC, our two HMRRC photographers take team photos of each team and then spend the rest of the meet taking action photos of the students competing.  Those photos are available on the HMRRC website.

At the track meets, students are allowed to choose no more than two events to run in.  The various events are scheduled so that the longer events are separated from each other as are the shorter events.  The 100m events are very popular so these events are run simultaneously on both sides of the track to save time.  All the events are organized so the students are running against boys or girls in their own grade.  Generally, the only exception to this rule is in the 1500m and 800m races where grades are combined and the runners are given dots on their bib numbers indicating their grade so the recorders can separate their times by grade.  The volunteers at the finish line are recording times and transferring those times for each heat to the volunteer recording crew so the time and finish places for each heat can be matched up.  This coordination sometimes becomes challenging.  Results for each race by grade are usually posted on the HMRRC web site the following week after the meets are conducted.

As one can surmise, it takes a host of club volunteers to conduct the meet in an efficient manner so the meet can end no later than 6:30 pm each day.  This year, we made it both days.  Since the meet was held at HVCC, right next to LaSalle Institute, we reached out to the LaSalle track coach to see if he would have some of his track athletes volunteer at our meets in return for a cash donation to the LaSalle track team’s booster club.  As it turned out, 23 track athletes from LaSalle worked the meets to supplement our club volunteers!  And speaking of our club volunteers, approximately 45 of them worked very hard trying to keep track of their various assignments and staying hydrated especially at the June 5th meet where the temperature hit the high 80’s forcing us to shrink the 1500m run to 1000 meters.  Fortunately, we had a HVCC trainer there to cover both meets and she barely had any business each day.  A success!

A couple of thank you notes below :

• The coordinators of the program, for the second year, were Ken Skinner (liaison with the school leaders), Tom McGuire (coordinator of activities the day of the meets) and Barbara Bradley (volunteer recruitment and assignments).
• Carol Reardon, the club’s administrator, supported the three administrators in various ways including ordering shirts, bib numbers, checking in volunteers and collating results of all the races (with the exception of the 100m races).
• John Parisella, the club’s equipment manager and caretaker of the clubhouse, for his help in reminding the coordinators what equipment they needed to conduct the meets.  John has also been the enthusiastic announcer at both our fall and spring meets the past few years keeping the school leaders and spectators informed of what’s going on and advertising the other races that HMRRC puts on.

Just Run was a great success in 2024! Check out the great photos captured at these events.

Summer Just Run:
June 5th - https://hmrrcphotos.smugmug.com/2024/Just-Run-June-5
June 10th - https://hmrrcphotos.smugmug.com/2024/Just-Run-June-10
Fall Just Run:
October 28th - https://hmrrcphotos.smugmug.com/2024/Just-Run-Cross-Country-October-28
October 29th - https://hmrrcphotos.smugmug.com/2024/Just-Run-Cross-Country-October-29