NYRR's Birthday Celebration + History Panel!

6/4/2017

Before I moved back to New York, one of the first things I did was sign up for a membership with New York Road Runners. I was super excited to have a huge group to run and race with, especially since the NYC Marathon is my dream race. When I heard it was their birthday (59 years young!), and they were hosting a celebration, I had to go.

NYRR recently opened a Run Center on 57th Street, where runners can pick up their race gear, check out some running history, and shop at the New Balance store. There are also lockers if you want to stash your stuff while you run in Central Park. It's really awesome to have a place where you can go to meet other runners, especially one so close to the park. On Friday night, they also hosted a 59th birthday party, featuring a special panel of guests to discuss the history of the sport.

The panel included Nina Kuscsik (the first woman to officially win Boston!), Gary Muhrcke (winner of the first NYC Marathon), and George Hirsch, chairman of the NYRR Board of Directors, and former publisher of Runner's World magazine.

During the panel, we got to hear a bunch of really crazy and interesting stories about the history of running in New York City. Some of the things we learned included:

Women had a separate start from the men at the NYC Marathon, until a sit-down protest in 1972 (see the photo below!), which Nina participated in!
Frank Shorter winning the men's marathon at the Berlin Olympics set off a big running boom...and it became "cool" to go out running.
Before Shorter won the Olympics, it was common to run in a local park and see nobody else on the road with you.
Nina said that if a woman was out running in the rain, it was common for cops to stop her to make sure she wasn't running from anything dangerous.
When the NYC Marathon was moved from loops in Central Park to all five boroughs, a certain crime organization didn't want to let the race close down the streets of Brooklyn...until they got enough money that is.
Fred Lebow (former NYRR President and founder of the NYC Marathon) was famous for playing to the media to get attention for races.
Most people on the panel think we'll eventually get to a 2:00 marathon, but it may not be anytime soon.

I honestly could have listened to them talk all night because their stories were so interesting. After the panel, Michael Capiraso (NYRR President and CEO) and Peter Ciaccia (Events President and NYC Marathon Race Director) led a quick toast to (at least) 59 more years of running.

And we got delicious birthday cake - perfect fuel for the upcoming race weekend if you ask me. We were invited to check out some different artifacts from NYRR history.