Athens Drive CC Course – Sam’s Eagle Project
Ultrarunner, all-conference cross-country athlete, and Mangum Track Club member Sam Day organized during February a two-week project to add a new trail section of approximately .5 miles to the Athens Drive HS cross-country course.
The new trail section traverses an area of woods adjacent to the stadium and track. On the first week of the project, the ADHS coach and many team members turned out. The coach marked the new trail and the team worked to rake away the duff.
On the second Saturday family and friends, including the John Marrota family from Charlotte, turned out to remove stumps and roots, grade the trail, and excavate under the stadium fence.
The work went well on both days. The new trail section is wide enough for two athletes to run stride-by-stride. It includes a couple of switchbacks and a steep downhill and steep uphill. It will be the end section of all the ADHS CC competitions starting next year. Runners will finish their event by climbing up a steep hill and entering the stadium.
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Tags: cross-country, scouts
Sam, What an undertaking and it sounds like you have certainly done yourself proud. As some trail races are on the verge of being cancelled due to state park funding cuts, here you are creating a new trail for your highschool to use for years to come. We should all take a lesson from you. Rick
I’d like to ask 2 simple favors of you. I need endurance runners and a easy/moderate 50 mile run route suggestions in the RTP area. The initial route planned for Lisa Smith Batchen & Sister Mary Beth Lloyd to run with Charlie Engle, has been scrapped due to vacation conflict. Since, I’m personally in the lower mileage ranges of running, I don’t have great knowledge of quality long course routes that might be preferred by someond of Lisa’s calibre.
Why?
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Professional endurance athlete Lisa Smith Batchen & her running partner Sister Mary Beth Lloyd (yes, as in nun) will be running 50 miles (in 1 day!) in the Chapel Hill and/or Raleigh NC area on May 5th, after kicking off the Running Hope Through America Charity run. RHTA will cover 50 miles in 50 states in 2 mos. time to raise money for children orphaned by AIDS. 2500 miles are planned in all if you did your math correctly
The event will celebrate a national launch from Central Park, live, on Good Morning America on 4/16. As the local volunteer coord. for this project, I have a press kit that I can share with you and would love to ask if you would be so kind as to put out an announcement through your NC runner network and/or newsletter for participants to run along for any desired distance of the 50 mile course with Lisa and Sister Mary Beth and post a link to the site at http://www.runhope.com. My goal in helping Lisa is simple… shine a light on a great cause and encourage others to help out a phenomenal charity organization. 100% of any donations made go directly to the charity… and as you may well know, Lisa Smith Batchen is a reputable and honest person.
Please contact me via email or by phone at (919) 215-4989 if I can get the media kit to you via email, etc.
In turn I promise to volunteer for your org in some way through this next year!
Thank you.
Dana Summitt
NC RHTA Volunteer Coordinator
(919) 215-4989