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Youngsters stretch distance of starting point
By JOE SHAFRAN
I don’t think we’ll ever run out of runners… These days, we’re starting them out at age two and the little ones seem to be anxious to show off their stuff. A few years back, I began to notice the youngster’s urge to run at the Strider’s Junior events that Roger Hebden and his volunteers arranged at the Bates Athletic Complex in Annapolis. That project is now directed by Jim Anderson, who is well into running . As for the little ones, running history may have been made this summer, when 3 year old Bella Nudelman of Annapolis ran the John Wall memorial mile at the Broadneck High School track coming in before cheering crowds in about 15 minutes.
I’ve been to many races these past months and I notice that in addition to the runs and walks, there have been well-attended kids runs. A week last Saturday at Bay Meadow Industrial Park at Glen Burnie ,I was amazed at the huge group of eight, nine and ten year old girls doing the Johns Hopkins Run for Your Life 5k directed by Sheryl Kline and a group of volunteers. The girls, close to 50 of them, were from the School of Incarnation at Gambrills enrolled in the Girls on the Run group. The Bay Meadow run was just a warm-up for a major December event at Greenbury Point in Annapolis. That bunch so enthused me, that I registered for the race, paid the fee, crouched at the start line with them and ran for most of the distance. I wanted to get back at the finish line to watch them. At the awards ceremony, with that whole group of girls sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of me I took the microphone and suggested that in their future years they retain the same determination to engage in athletics as they did in that 5K training exercise at Bay Meadow.
I also noticed the urge to run a week last Sunday at the Naval Academy Primary School 5K run at Greenbury Point where they had dashes for the little ones, from age two and up. The Naval School has been around a while. The male winner of the 5k race was James Anderson, 47, the Strider, who recalled he went to NAPS as a first grader, 41 years ago. His time 41 years later was 18 minutes.
Also in that race were District Court Judge Jonas Legum, his wife and daughter, who probably live as close to the school as anyone and hopefully ran to the start line. At the Downs Park 5K the end of October, they had a hundred yard Tot Run that was limited to kids 6 and under. One of these days we’ll see if we can’t post the results in this column.
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Thanksgiving is the time of year when there are races to work up an appetite before the big feast ... One of them was the annual Cold Turkey 10 K last Sunday at South River High in memory of Kati Fisher, which is a graduation race, for those who did the training class headed by Mesdames, Cogle and Goldstein, of the Striders and the other, the 5K at Camp Letts in the woods and on the water at Edgewater. Thanksgiving morning, the only place where if the planets are properly aligned one might actually see a wild turkey, according to Sgt. Marvin Dorsey, of the Smithsonian Environmental security detail, the next door neighbor.
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Running tip: Before a run, do a five minute warm-up and the same when you finish. People watching you might think you are doing a yoga exercise. Your hamstrings will thank you.
Race of the week…Dashing through the Show.. at Sandy Point State Park ,a night time event where the runners get a preview of the annual Lights on the Bay spectacle put on by the Anne Arundel Medical Center and other groups.
Runner of the Week…. Brad Chapman, 76, who ran the recent Downs Park 5 miler in a respectable 57 minutes. Chapman will have to wait until he’s 80 to get into another age bracket and not get whooped every time by the 72 year old youngster, Don Singer, of Annapolis who did the race in 42 minutes.
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Running Calendar:
Dec. 9.. 10 A.M. Quiet Waters Park, Annapolis
29th Anniversary Striders 15K run.
No. 8 in the championship series.
Call Susan Zevin at 410.573.9424
Race Results:
Downs Park 5 Miler. Nov. 3. (Top 10 from the Strider web pages)
1. Eric Westland, 23, 28:06. 2. Matt Mace, 47, 30:06,23, 3. Paul Serra, 51, 30:42, 4. James Fitch, 43, 30:52, 5. Amanda Beal, 27, 31:21.6. Tim Lowe, 40, 31:31, 7. Anderson Wilhelm, 52, 31:32, 8. Rob Tisch, 36, 31:46, 9. Robert Cawood , 39, 31:47, 10. Greg Behmann , 42, 31:49.
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If you have a suggestion for the runner of the week,
please e-mail me with a contact number.
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