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What a difference a week
makes!!! Last weekend we were trying to get races completed
before the sky fell on us. In Prentiss we barely finished
before the lightning started and the youngsters ran in the
rain. This weekend a new race was held and the conditions
could not have been nicer. We even had a 10:00 am start and
it was not too hot.
As you have probably read in the
Hattiesburg American, a 5K race was held to raise funds for
research into Niemann-Pick disease. This is a rare disease
only diagnosed in about 700 children world-wide. One of
those children, Chase Jackson, is a student at Oak Grove
Lower Elementary School. Patti Permenter, a teacher at that
school, also has a nephew with the disease so she lead a
group of teachers to organize this event. For being novices
at organizing road races, they did a great job for a first
time event. The turnout was beyond expectations, there were
plenty of volunteers for registration and to work as course
monitors, and they even had the course well protected with
two policemen and three fire rescue trucks. We never
get this level of cooperation from the protection services
when holding an event in Hattiesburg! Hattiesburg American
representatives were on the scene to record coverage for
Sunday's edition. I am wondering if all the cooperation and
coverage was due to attendance by local celebrity and
glamour girl Millie Mozingo?
The course was an out and back
from the Lower Elementary School and winding through Lake
Serene. It was a tough route with the last half mile being
up hill. Both the 5K and one mile events started
simultaneously. The first to cross the finish line were two
young girls in the one mile event. They ran hard and
finished with smiles. First was Madison closely followed by
Caitlin. We had a little breakdown in collecting the
finishing sequence for all 5K runners, but the following are
times for the first 14 people. (Note: I have times for 70
finishers, just not sure of the sequence.)
1 - Keith Barrett
20:49 first male
2 - Jonathan Geroux 21:16
3 - Charles Jackson 23:23
4 - Brent Wolf
23:28
5 - Scott Piland
23:28
6 - Audrey Jackson
23:45 first female
7 - Chris Chatham
24:41 first young male
8 - Jim Ford
24:43
9 - Jessica
Humphreys 25:01 first young female
10 - Traci
Walters 25:03
11 - David Williamson 25:41
12 - Amberly Brown 25:49
13 - Julie Ford
26:07
14 - Teresa Jenny 26:12
Awards went to the four first
place finishers noted above. All of the younger
participants also won prizes. All remaining proceeds went
toward the disease research.
A couple final notes. Jim Ford
finished in eight place pushing a double stroller with his
twin boys. That had to be a real workout going up that
hill! I got to manage the start and finish lines and had to
take some serious ribbing from Tony about finally being in
charge. Charles continues to come in ahead of Audrey even
though he said he has been sick all week. Keith Barrett was
sick in Boston, but looks strong for next weekend in
Nashville!
Run for Your Life.
©
Steve Ulery
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