Happy 4th of July. Hope everyone has had a good holiday weekend. The recent weather has been sunny, if hot, and I hope everyone has been getting in their running miles each morning. With COVID, school closures, remote working and less to do otherwise, running (at least solo or in small groups) has not taken a back seat for a lot of us.  We also are generally moving ahead with reopening in the Rochester area more successfully than many places in the country. Following that trend, we have good news about both the GRTC (no longer spring) running clinic and the Candlelight 12 event.

With NY now well into phase IV of reopening we feel we can fit all requirements to go forward with the GRTC (no longer spring) running clinic. We plan to start our 7-week program on 8/5/20. This year the clinic will take place at Center Park in Fairport (1100 Ayrault road adjacent to the Perinton Recreation Center). The site provides a variety of running areas and surfaces with various distances to work with. For those who have participated in the clinic before, there will be changes forced on us by COVID and regulations, but we are committed to a great experience for all (maybe new and better in some aspects). Our goals continue to be giving everyone fun, fellowship and state of the art training for better running performance and enjoyment. We plan on keeping all protocols for COVID safety in place for everyone’s protection. As in the past we will meet each week at 5:45. We will have a ½ hour didactic session, followed by warm up drills, the structured individual specific training runs, and then cool down and group stretching. We should be wrapped up each time at 8:00 pm. We are excited in this “COVID journey” to see the clinic go forward. We still have open slots but will cap at 50 to meet COVID reopening regulations. Signup is open as below on runsignup. Will hope to see you there.

Also, although the Candlelight 12 ultra will NOT take place in person this year it WILL go forward in a virtual format this month. Virtual options are more fun than we thought and can get us all out running without any COVID risk. Sign up for the race below and you will be able to run any consecutive 12 hour block from 7:00 PM 7/18 till 7:00 AM 7/26. You can choose any course you like (road, trail, treadmill, combination, whatever). You then email your mileage (CandleLight12Hour@gmail.com) and will receive race awards by mail afterwards. If you always wanted to do this kind of a 12 hour event but were reluctant to run overnight in the dark, HERE IS YOUR CHANCE! Check out further details and sign up at the link below.

Going forward we are encouraged that the fall will bring back RROY races, the Freezeroo series and of course our banquet in the winter. It’s been an “interesting” year, and perhaps one that none of us want to repeat, but we expect to come out of it stronger as individuals and as a club. See you out on the road (6 feet apart).

Doug Jones (President GRTC)

Candlelight 12 Signup: https://runsignup.com/Race/NY/HoneoyeFalls/CandleLight12HourOvernightUltra

RunningClinic:https://runsignup.com/Race/NY/Rochester/GreaterRochesterTrackClubSpringClinicsandTrackWorkouts

GRTC Membership: https://runsignup.com/Club/NY/Rochester/GreaterRochesterTrackClu