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Now I would like to add an addendum because this is not only the report for the past year, but in my case, the report for the last 20 years. That is how long that I have been President of the Heartland Racewalkers in our 26 year history. As you probably know, I have decided that it is time for someone else to take the reins and lead our club in the coming years and, fortunately we have a veteran officer of our club who has agreed to do that, BJ Thornburg. Before I conclude this major portion of my life, I would like to reflect on some of the things that our club has accomplished in these past 20 years.

When I took over the club in 1996, I had just come back from a one-year sabbatical in Durham, NC. I had been racewalking for about 10 years at the time and was able to enter a large number of local races in North Carolina as well as competing in the National Senior Games in San Antonio that year. The club was not very large at the time since we had lost our main coaches, Don & Debbie Lawrence and then Pathe Price and Jim Fogle. For a while we maintained our twice a week clinics, with the second one being at 6:30 on Wednesdays. But that dwindled away after a few years. Then we started getting renewed interest, partly due to the website that I set up as our newsletter under the editorship of Ed Levy and myself was superseded by our electronic newsletter and then the whole expanded website with Jake Fowler as webmaster.

Our meeting place (initially called Health Plus) had a number of owners over the years, from Health Midwest, to HCA to private owners. During this time, we also moved our meeting room from upstairs to downstairs to the front room to one of two back rooms. Steve Figoni and I ran several training sessions for outside groups: one was breast cancer survivors who wanted to train for the Race for the Cure. Another was the transplant group that was training for the National Transplant Games. We are very fortunate that Pamela Felton started with that group and has sustained her membership with us over the years. I have presented many racewalking clinics around the Metro and then was aided a number of times by BJ and Fred. These were for adults, coaches and youths in the area. Fred and I made a number of visits to a grade school in Independence to start a racewalking activity at their recess period and our club also sponsored them in a race around Arrowhead Stadium.

In 2004, we hosted the USATF World Cup Team trials in 2004 in Corporate Woods when Curt Clausen visited us. Most of the elite racewalkers came in to participate in this series of races, the chief one being the 20 K walk. In 2008, Eileen McManus and I represented the club in the USATF National Club Track & Field Championships where there were no age divisions and still picked up enough points to beat some running clubs. In 2013 our club was the local team at the USATF National Masters Outdoor meet in Olathe, I had the opportunity to help certify the course. Our club garnered 14 medals between the 5K and the 10,000 meter walks.

Over the years, we brought in a number of national coaches to present clinics. These included Ray Funkhouser, Dave McGovern (twice), Jeff Salvage, Carolyn Kealty, Debbie Lawrence and Jonathan Matthews. That is another way that our club is known on the national stage. Because of our national prominence, several members of our club were featured in a book on racewalking by Brent Bohlen, including profiles of Jean Brunnenkant and me and a comment about Tom Young.

Our club has entered many races over the years that were initially set up for runners. In 2001, I set up our first team to enter the Brew to Brew Relay to Lawrence. We were the only racewalking team and set a precedent by beating a number of running teams using the age-graded finishing times. At one time we had four teams in the Brew to Brew. I also arranged to have teams in the Blue Springs Marathon and Half-Marathon Relays in Independence. Once we had five teams who entered. In recent years, we have also set up teams in the Patriots Day Run. That has been in four different locations in Olathe and we have had wonderful participation, many times with 20 or more walkers.

I have also been able to persuade some local road race organizers to include racewalking divisions in their races. These have included the Gobbler Grind, the Father’s Day Run and the Cliff Hanger and there have been others. This has raised the visibility of our club and helped promote racewalking in the Metro. In addition to gaining support from some local race organizers, I have also been able to gain discounts for our club from some local running stores, that includes Gary Gribbles (now 20%) and Metro Walk/run.

Over the years we have had a number of youth members who excelled in regional and national competition. That included Emma Carter who won medals in the NAIA national meet in Olathe and actually competed in the USA-Canadian competition and did a sub-24 minute 5K. Other successful youth members who did well nationally included Kiara Bunton, Santosh and Lakshmi Dandi. A major event occurred in our club’s history a few years ago when Health Plus, now called Fitness Plus, closed their doors. Their old building and management couldn’t compete with the newer public and private fitness centers. This was a critical time for our club since a physical indoor facility is vital for a club in the Midwest. Fortunately I was able to negotiate an arrangement with the Jewish Community Center that has proven very successful, with indoor and outdoor venues and meeting rooms. We are very lucky that it is also only a short distance away from our former location.

An accomplishment that I cherish is the bringing together of Floyd Delon and Martie Lykens. Martie was one of the founding members of our club along with Phil Jacobs and me. When I recruited Floyd into our club many years ago when he was a widower, he met Martie who had lost her husband. The rest is history during which they not only got married on a ship in the Mediterranean but also have entered countless races locally, regionally and nationally. Another twosome that found the Heartland Racewalkers a warm place to meet were Jean Brunnenkant and Tom Young, who were my role models and frequently featured in local newspapers. Jean brought more glory to our club by winning the Senior Sportswoman of the Year from the WIN Network some years ago. Several of us were able to attend the banquet at the Hyatt Regency with about 1,000 in attendance where the award was given. She was recognized in a competition that included all sports, not just running or walking. Because of Tom Young’s many years of service to our club, we recognized his name on a plaque on a bench in Roe Park that also recognizes some other meritorious club members, including Al Armstrong, Ed Levy and Don Swegel.

On a personal note, the inspiration from previous coaches of our club has helped me attain recognition at the national and international level with many Gold Medals at the National Senior Olympics, the USATF Indoor and Outdoors and the National State Games of America. This also includes Gold Medals at the Huntsman World Games in St. George, UT and the Nike World Games in Eugene, OR. The highest honor that I got was taking two Gold Medals in the biannual World Masters Athletics Championships in Sacramento in 2011 (5,000 and 10,000 meters). I was also part of the USA country championship team that resulted in another Gold Medal and selection as the USATF national racewalker of the year in the 75-79 age division. As mentioned before, this honor was repeated this year in the 80-84 division. Along the way, I have also collected a number of state and national records from 1500 meters to 5K.

Finally, my greatest satisfaction over the years with our club is the realization of just how many individuals, from the younger to the older, have taken up our sport and achieved a better level of fitness while having fun. They and you are all emissaries to the wider world who now have a better appreciation of what a grand pastime that we have adopted.