Annual Holiday Party and Meeting

by Ryan Goebel with photos from Alicia MacLeay, Butch Parker, ​Kate Scott, Amy Stabins, and David Colby Young

On Saturday, December 9, the Central Maine Striders met at a member's house to hold their annual holiday social, meeting, elections, and jingle bell social run.  Most attendees came dressed up in their finest holiday-themed running outfits and ran around 3 miles around the neighborhood.  Despite sending out an email earlier in the week reminding the social run group about the start time, Treasurer Ron Peck forgot the meeting time and showed up nearly a half hour late, but still managed to get a couple miles in before the business meeting began.  Also before the meeting began, Ian Hepburn took the holiday outfit game to another level by changing out of his light bedazzled running outfit and into a full holiday-themed suit!

One of agenda items at the club's year-end meetings is typically some sort of awards.  Following the pattern of last year, awards were given out to two members in each of three categories, as chosen by the club's officers.  Besides getting a beautiful certificate and the glory of being a Strider award winner, the winners each received a $25 gift card to RunningWarehouse.com (which, combined with the club's 10% discount, technically held a value of $27.78).

The 2023 Striders Spirit Award was given to Sapan Bhatt and Alicia McCarthy for their positive spirit while representing the club.  Next, the President's Award was given to Julie Millard and Martha Nadeau for their invaluable contributions to the club during the year.  And finally, the 2023 Striders of the Year awards went to Billy Kobin and Lindsey Madison for their running achievements while representing the club during the year.  While we don't have the room nor the memory to list all the accomplishments of these amazing six club members through out the year, we can say that all of them contributed immensely to the club by volunteering at events, setting various personal bests, hosting other runners for social runs, and just generally being wonderful people who continually show up and participate in our little club.

Lindsey Madison

Billy Kobin

Martha Nadeau

Julie Millard

Alicia McCarthy

Sapan Bhatt

Before continuing the meeting, Kate Scott announced that there was one more award or gift to be given.  She then presented outgoing President Ryan Goebel a photo book compiled by several club members from the years of his club presidency (2020-2023) and a card signed by everyone at the year-end meeting as a thanks for his contributions to the club over the last four years.

Ryan Goebel

The final item of business for the evening was to announce the election results.  By unanimous decision, the entire Board of Directors was reappointed to their positions.  The Board of Directors includes Patrick Guerette, Alicia MacLeay, Tom McGuire, Julie Millard, Ron Peck, and Ron Paquette.  Secretary Amy Stabins, Treasurer Ron Peck, and Vice President Kate Scott were all re-elected to their positions,  And, Martha Nadeau was elected to be the next club President.  Tom McGuire pointed out that Martha will be the club's first woman president, to which Ryan Goebel added that it is also the first time that the majority of the club officers are women.  

After the meeting was adjourned, most attendees stuck around to continue eating lasagna, holiday treats, and drink beverages.  Some Fireball may have also made the rounds.

President Martha Nadeau

Secretary Amy Stabins

Treasurer Ron Peck