Race Director's Corner

2007 Race Summary & Highlights

Also in the Race Director's Corner:

Hello DxA2 Runners – the 2007 race was quite an adventure for me and everyone else involved. From late nights responding to e-mails, putting out the course mile markers at 2 am the night before the race, to pelting rain and downed trees the day of the race. It all was memorable!

As you likely know, last year was my first year as head race director. I’d been an assistant for many years under Renee Rienas (Badall) and Lew Kidder. But taking on the whole hog was a whole different ballgame! Unfortunately there was a lack of records available to pass over to me from the previous director. On top of that I had to rebuild the entire race committee as well, as most of them stepped down along with the previous director, so that added to the challenge of taking over the reins. But the group I put together was up to the task, and we barreled forward and over came all obstacles in our path!

The race turned out very well. (You can quote me!) Sure, it was not without it’s hiccups and glitches, but there were no major problems. (Of course I did come up with a list of about 50 things I hope to improve on, but that’s my problem!) The main organizational issue we had last year was a brief water shortage at the finish line, and some long food lines. That stuff was resolved fairly quickly, and I hope no one was unduly put upon by that. Given what happened at Chicago in 2007, it’s obvious that careful planning is mandatory for large running events and even with professional operations with full time staffers, things can go wrong. It’s also evident that sometimes things happen that don’t always work the way we’d like no matter how well plans are laid. Running thousands of people through city streets in the out of doors is simply not an entirely controlled process. Dem’s the facts. If you expect perfection, gaze at the stars I guess, but don’t look at me when we’re huntin’ for someone with a chain saw to clear the a tree from Huron River Drive about ten minutes before the darn race is scheduled to start! Ok, back to planet earth…

Some of the highlights of the 2007 race included (click the links or scroll down for details):

A new national record
The Soup Kitchen Stampede
The Expo in Ypsi
Bringing Paul McMullen to the race
The TREE!
The finisher medal
Team Braylon
Our race sponsors
The race committee and all of the volunteers
The runners!

Details

A new national record: A national record was set for the male 15 year old half marathon distance by Jason Bishop of Dexter. His time of 1:10:15 was good enough for 6th place overall in our race, and eclipsed the previous 22 year old national record by over TWO minutes! Congratulations Jason! You can view the record posting at: http://www.runningusa.org/php/rec-form.php

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The Soup Kitchen Stampede: we added this event last year and it was a great event. We had over one hundred people attend, raised some money for our charitable causes, had a good meal, listened to some great speakers, and had a great time. Paul McMullen was the featured speaker. He told us all about his 1500 meter national championships, his 1996 Olympic run and his lawn mower accident. We had many former race directors including Elmo Morales in attendance, as well as Dan Gamble, the only person to have run the race every year since it has started in 1974. Also attending were Boston Marathon Champ Greg Meyer, Mega-marathoner Doug Kurtis, and former Olympic walker Gary Morgan. I’m not sure how we will top it this year, but we’re gonna try!

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The Expo in Ypsi: this was not a popular choice for some of the Ann Arbor based runners, but it location ended up working out very well. The air conditioned comfort was a definite step up from the past few years. The balcony track there that allowed us to keep from canceling the Kids Run also turned out to be a great asset. Overall it worked out so well that we’ll be keeping it here again this year. (Better use of existing parking there is planned for this year.)

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Bringing Paul McMullen to the race: Our race hadn’t had a marquee athlete in for many tears. We invited Paul to attend both the Stampede and the race expo. He had a great presence at both events. He was a good speaker, and a great ambassador for the sport of running, and brought along a lot of signed copies of has “I Dare You to Run” video. He also helped lead all of the heats of the Kids Run and his energy was infectious! I was glad he was willing and able to join us.

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The TREE! That blasted tree that went down on Huron River Drive just before the 10K start almost put a major wrench in the works, but we caught it and cleared it with only a 20 minute delay to the races. Take that “Mother Nature”! (The Crim had tornados, power outages and a building collapse next to their course last year, so things could have been worse!)

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The finisher medal: The race had used them before, but not for about 8 years. having a medal at the event was not initially something I was keen on, but the AATC board persisted so I gave in. We ended up using the design I created, and the medals ended up being very popular (if I don’t say so myself!) We plan to keep using them for now, with a similar design for future years.

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Team Braylon: Team Braylon was organized and lead by a very energetic Kim Foerster of Fenton. Braylon was young Kim’s son who died prior to the race at just under one year of age from a congenital heart condition. He spent much of his young life at C.S. Mott’s Children’s Hospital. Braylon’s mom organized a huge team of supporters from her family, friends and people from the hospital to come to Ann Arbor and make the race a living memorial to her son. She got over 100 people to join the team – many of whom had never run a race before. (I know that because she told me and because of some of the questions they asked me!!) They wore orange shirts and had hearts of gold.

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Our race sponsors: there were a lot of good sponsors behind the race when I took over, but I managed to add a number of new ones including NuStep, MedSport, and Running Fit/New Balance. The support of Comerica and all of our sponsors helps make the race a success and helps to keep it on firm financial ground, which is very important! Thanks to all of you.

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The race committee and all of the volunteers: the effort of everyone that stepped up to make the race success was amazing. The event requires over 200 volunteers. The only professionals involved are the timing company, the photographers, and me. (And I barely count in that category!) Everyone else is a volunteer. (If you’d like to volunteer for 2008, click here)

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The runners: the support of over 5000 runners is what made the event the success that it was. It wasn’t the biggest race ever, but it was pretty close! I hope you all had a good time in spite of the rain, and I hope to see you all back this year on June 1st!

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Well, that’s the top 10 list for 2007. There were a lot of other great things that happened – too many to mention. Overall 2007 was a tough year for me, but was a great experience looking back at it. I don’t want another year like it any time soon, but with the work I put in last year, I laid a new foundation of records and volunteers that we will be able to build off of for years to some. Thanks for your support of running and the Dexter - Ann Arbor Run.

Hal Wolfe
Dexter - Ann Arbor Run Race Director