Been a while

It has been a while since my last blog. Sad to say I am writing this to recognize another one of our runners who passed away. Denise McFadden, age 51 was killed by a snow plow last month. Denise has run in 6 of 7 of our Delaware marathons and was scheduled to run again this year. She always ran the Caesar Rodney half, the Thanksgiving Day 10K, and just recently the PSCI Icicle ten miler. My heart sank when I saw her obituary. I received so many emails about her passing I thought it only right to do something to recognize her. I have started a new award at our Delaware Marathon. The first female Delaware marathon finisher will receive the Denise McFadden award. Plus the Delaware Marathon will make a donation to Padua Academy in Denise's honor. I have received so many emails from her friends and family thanking me for this new award. I will make a special presentation of Denise's marathon number to her family race day. Her spirit I am sure will be with us. Someone emailed me and told me that I touch so many lives with my events. I gave it some thought. "Touching lives one race at a time."

Obits

I am one of those folks who read the obituaries. Don't ask me why. I guess it is because I would rather see that a friend or acquaintance died in print rather than hearing it via the grapevine. Either way I was shocked to see that one of my favorite runners had passed away. Some of you may know her since she placed in most events in the 60 plus age group. Her name is Beth Manning Tomanelli. She died peacefully on Nov. 18th from pancreatic cancer. At the Thanksgiving Day run walk for MS I spoke with her husband Rocco and her brother Bill Manning. Bill told me that she was a chubby kid who did not start running till in her 40's. I told Bill that she held both the 10k and 5k records in this event for her age group. Rocco told me she was diagnosed in September. Three months later she passed away. In her obituary instead of flowers she wanted donations to be made to the Western YMCA or to races2run. I cried when i read this. I felt that she chose me to help out others who are less fortunate. Barb and I decided that we would put together a scholarship in Beth's name for the Girls on the Run Delaware program. Beth's husband and family were thrilled about this and donations are coming in via mail and online. Donations online can be made here:
https://www.raceit.com/Fundraising/?event=2513
or via mail to PO Box 24, Montchanin, DE 19710.
I would hope that Beth too would be pleased.

Girls on the Run 5k

Every once in a while I have the honor of working on an event that really showcases what running in Delaware is all about. Today was one of those days. Liz Baldwin, Kim Chitty, and Melissa Rice are the hardest working race directors I have ever worked for. Meeting with them is time well spent. They are just so organized. From set up to break down these three ladies do it all. The indoor registration was perfect. No need to worry about weather conditions. The colorful GOR Team signs stationed through out Dravo Plaza let teams know where to meet. Over 1200 runners and walkers today. A perfect day on the Riverfront. I would like to thank all who came out to support Girls on the Run. You all really made it a special day.

It's out of here.....

It's a long drive to center field....back....back...back....it's out of here.

Earl....

I am at the beach for Sunday's Dewey Beach Lions Club 5k. So much talk about Hurricane Earl going on. Homes are boarded up.....trash cans on the boardwalk are in storage and the Rehoboth life guards were hanging out not even sure if they were going to work today. Storm warnings but NO rain, NO high winds, NO sunshine. The waves are not even that big. And yes....folks are in the water. I was thinking about what would happen if the Lions Club 5k was today rather than Sunday? My guess is that I would have had to postpone since ALL city services are on call. Weather wise we could have run a 5k this morning but would anyone show up? I use these methods to let folks know that an event is postponed or cancelled. I email the list of entrants, I use my Twitter account, I post a notice on my homepage and I leave a voice message on my work phone. When a hurricane warning like this goes into effect two days prior I get more time to get the word out. It gets really difficult when you have to make the call early race morning.

Fall weather in the air.....

Getting closer to cool weather.....and that means getting ready to run longer distances and races. Sept. 11th kicks off our 34th Gary P Lister Bottle & Cork ten miler and 5k. Many run this event as a warm up for the following weeks Philly Half Marathon. For many this is a stepping stone to a fall marathon. Many of these marathons are selling out faster than ever before. The Philly Marathon is about to close out. Locally we have the Cafe Gelato ten miler and the Delaware Distance Classic 15k both held in Oct. We also have a series of 10k events starting with the E Racing the Blues 10k on Oct 31st. Next comes the annual Turkey Trot 10k the Saturday prior to Thanksgiving and on Thanksgiving day the PNC run walk 10k
and 5k. I hope those of you who run our 5k's will step it up a notch and think about the 10k distance. Like they say...step at a time.

World record run....Kip Litton

Check out this website http://www.worldrecordrun.com. You will not see any info on our Delaware Marathon. Why....because this guy Kip Litton was dq'ed. And I am not the only race director who has dq'ed him. Kip is trying to raise money for CF....but who are checks written to? His website. I have a team of 3 runners who have researched this guy. What we have come up with will blow your mind. Yes...he may be capable of running under 3 hours so why cheat? Look at the photo of his shoes as he crossed our DE Marathon finish line. NO D Tag! I emailed him about this and his response was "it was broken so I placed it in my sock". He stated that he has run over 100 races. OK...so he should know know how to put on D tag properly.... right? Before I dq'ed him I emailed our Regional RRCA director who also ran in our marathon and asked him what he thought. He said I have the right to DQ him. I then emailed Kip Litton to let him know that he has been dq'ed from my event. He did not respond back. NO splits....no photos on Brightroom.com...NO pics from the race director taking photos at the turn a round on the riverwalk at 14 miles. HELLO. Why would someone travel this far NOT to run a marathon.....I give up.