Running Backwards to 2013: A Jog Into the Striders Archives

This month we're running back to 2013, which seems to have been a resurgent year for the Striders.  In fact, you could probably say that it was the start to a new era for the club.  There were a lot of great articles reminiscing about the past from some club members that had been around a long time, and at the same time, it seems that Patrick Guerette, along with the help of Harold Shaw and a few others, were bringing the club into the modern era.  The webpage was created, a Facebook page started, and the Quarry Road Summer Race series was run for the first time.

There were so many good articles in the Interval in 2013 that I just can't include them all in this job into the archives.  I don't want to make it an "ultra jog" into the past, since O don't want too many DNF's on this edition.

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We don't have space to print the whole article here, but I'm going to bet that Craig Lewis is/was some kind of medical professional, possibly a sports doctor or physical therapist.  His article in the January 2013 Interval started out with:

"I have been collecting health benefits of exercise articles for five decades."

FIVE DECADES!  That's a lot of articles!

He also used lots of big medical words and phrases, like rapamycin, enzymic, telomere, senescent, and hippocampi.

As was the norm during a long period of Interval newsletters, Linda Benn saved a small spot on the bottom of the front page for some news or notes from the editor:

.  Did somebody say race series?

Oh, and someone mentioned officers?

Yes, that's right.  When 2013 started, the Striders didn't have any officers and there weren't any local race series.

And that's when Patrick Guerette showed up and more or less transformed the Striders into what they are today.  

​(Yes, Patrick, that's right.  I'm giving you credit, because you deserve it.  Thanks for everything you've done for the club.)

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Announcement for the 2013 January Thaw :

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Strider Mike Brooks had his named splashed on the pages of the Interval several times in 2013.  Usually, he was just running little races like the the Ironhorse 100 Miler in Florida, the Bataan Death March in New Mexico, running three marathons in three days around Lake Tahoe, the "Dust Bowl Races" (5 marathons in 5 days in 5 different states -- Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico), or the "Savage Seven" (7 marathons in 7 days in Florida).  

[In a probably not related story, I saw on Facebook recently that Mike recently had total knee replacement surgery.  Mike, we hope your knee heals quickly and you're able to get back to running many marathons in many consecutive days soon!]

Ron Paquette and Mike Brooks at the Ironhorse 100 races in Florida

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One of the many historically interesting articles in that year, was this one from David Benn in the February 2013 issue of the Interval.  It gives you an idea of just how active the Striders were as a club in their heyday and how many races they put on, AND how many different club members were race directors.

For the full results from the 2013 January Thaw Road Race, click here.

Perhaps the "penguins" were too intimidating, which is why most of the 2013 January Thaw race finishers aren't in this photo.

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In early March of 2013, there was a Striders meeting and some of the items discussed included:
- "A new CMS slogan.  "we share the roads" doesn't accurately reflect the makeup of runners in Central maine, because we share everything. [As far as I know, the slogan was just dropped and not replaced]
- Bringing back some CMS singlets and t-shirts for members.
- Developing a Central Maine Striders website.  Key components being a race & events calendar as well as a way to join the Striders (printable or online reg). -- Harold Shaw
- Add any upcoming races to the Facebook Page under events, great way to promote your race 
​- Lastly, an outline of Patrick's plans for the summer race series to be held at the Quarry Rd:

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More than 100 runners showed up to the Joseph's 5k in Fairfield.  Five of those runners are current Striders:  Harold Shaw, Maria Bickford, Susan Brooks, Doug Brooks, and Jim Moore.  Strider Julie Millard was the race director. 

​[Editor's note:  Julie told me that she likes race directing almost as much as she loves running Mount Washington and ultra-marathons.]

Julie Millard finishes her first (and only) ultra.

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It looks like the MacLeay family joined the Striders in 2013:

And you "might of seen" that Alicia was the first placed woman and 2nd overall runner in that year's Quarry Road Race Series and also ended up becoming the Strider's Communications officer from 2015 to 2018.

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Someone made this design for a 2014 Striders shirt.  Not sure who designed it or whether any of the shirts actually were made (since strangely enough, I don't recall ever seeing anyone wear one).

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And then in the May 2013 newsletter, the start of the Quarry Road Summer Race Series was announced.  Although it seems that there have been some minor changes to the format, the series is still going today.  As far as I know, no one misses the 10k races that were part of the series the first year.

If you'd like to see the full results of the Quarry Road series from 2013, scroll down to the bottom of this flashback article.

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The June 2013 Interval featured a front page race report from Julie Millard about her first Ultramarathon.

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The July and August issues of the newsletter featured "My Marathoning Life, Parts 2 and 3" by Joanie Rhoda, which described her experience of qualifying for the Boston Marathon at the age of 59 and then running 25 miles of the 2013 Boston Marathon before the course was shut down due to the bombing near the finish line.  I found these articles to be heartwarming, inspiring, and heartbreaking.  I decided to reach out to Joanie as part of our "Catching Up With The Pack" series, which you can read here.  I've also published the full articles of "My Marathoning Life", Parts 2 and 3, as well as her article from 2012 called "Marathoning Then and Now" (which I assumed was the "Part 1" of this series).  You should really click on that link and read all three articles, as well as Joanie's updates on what she's doing now.  Just in case you missed the link the first time, here it is again:  click here. 
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[Editor's note:  I wanted to publish her articles here, but as you can tell this flashback article is already getting really long]

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Buried in the middle of the August 2013 newsletter was this article of "observations" from former club president David Benn regarding reviving the Striders into a more active running club.  It gives some interesting insight into where the club was back in 2013 and how significant the revival was that year.

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From the September 2013 issue of The Interval:

Gene went on in quite a bit of detail about what he described as the three booms of running.  The first was roughly 1896 to 1929; the second started in the early 1970's and included mentions of famous American runners like Frank Shorter, Bill Rodgers, Steve Prefontaine, and Maine's most famous runner, Joan Benoit; and the third boom being "now" (or around 2013 when the article was written.

I'd love to be able to reprint Gene's fascinating whole article here, since it has a lot of interesting historical running information, but I'm trying to keep this feature from running into novel length and trying to keep the perspective narrowed to the Central Maine Striders and not the running world at large.

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By October 2013, the revival was the Striders was starting to find some structure.  Officers for the next year were nominated and a ballot was included in the newsletter.  As is the tradition, none of the officer positions were contested.

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In November of 2013, longtime and still very active member Ron Paquette dug into the Striders history by finding an old piece by Rick Krause about the founding of the club.  I'm really glad to have found this article by Ron and would love to find more about those early days of the club.

Just to reinforce what Ron said in the end of that article: "As the new group of enthusiastic officers embark on the challenge of this new chapter of the Central Maine Striders, let's all join them by giving them all the support that we can.  Volunteering, participating, and recruiting will be a great way to show our appreciation - whether you are in for fun and socializing, health benefits, or the competitive spirit - GET INVOLVED."  No truer words have ever been spoken about what it takes to keep a club running through years.

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And by the end of the year, the new officers for the club were made official:

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And here are the full results from the first ever Quarry Road Summer Race Series, as published in various issues of The Interval that year:

Overall series winners included current CMS members:

​Overall Male:  Brian Morin
Overall Female:  Alicia MacLeay
F 18 & Under:  Cecilia Morin
F 50 & Up:  Julie Millard

In total, 195 different runners participated in at least one Quarry Road Race that summer.  Sounds like it was a success!

Congratulations for making it to the end of another marathon jog through the Central Maine Striders archive.  Sometimes, you never know where running backwards can take you.  Although, I recommend you run forwards in all cases not related to reading articles about the history of the Central Maine Striders.