Off and Running

Story by Lindsay Panzica
Photos courtesy of RotaryAllStars.com

The rush of running down a field or a track, the anticipation of beating your rivals, the nervous tension of watching and hoping on the sidelines, and the excitement of cheering on your team.  All of these aspects are what can make sporting events pastimes that have the ability to bring people of all ages together. The North Country Rotary Club decided to hold a summer open track meet in order to bring together the community ad raise money for worthy causes.

For the first time, the Rotary club is hosting The North Country Rotary Summer Open. This is an extension of the annual Rotary All-Star Football Game, the Tupper Lake Rotary Club's largest yearly fundraiser. This is the sixth year that the football game will be held in Tupper Lake. This year, though, the Rotary club has added the track meet as well.

"We were doing the football game, and its always a lot of fun, but it mostly attracts younger boys... We came up with the track meet as a way of attracting girls and citizens of all ages."

The football game will be held on Thursday, July 16, and the track meet on Saturday, July 18. The meet will be comprised of several events including the 100-meter dash, relays, hurdles, shot put, discus, long jump and more. The field events are scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. and the track events will begin around 10 a.m. The variety of events offered at the open is meant to not only attract more participants, but make is possible for people of all ages to participate.

"As of now, the ages range from the youngest being the bantam group, comprised of fifth and sixth graders, up to seniors ages 55 and up," Gordie Duval, high school track coach says.

The Rotary sponsors numerous local and international charities, and the proceeds of the summer open will help benefit those charities. The Rotary Club sends money to an orphanage in Rwanda each year, but the majority of the money raised will be put into benefiting local charities.  The Rotary Club has been involved in the track and sports of this area for some time now.  High school track coach Ted Merrihew says that the Rotary club sponsored the construction of the track 10 years ago.

"Any proceeds we try to kick back to the community in order to benefit young people," Dattola says. "I would say that about 85-90 percent of the money stays in the community or in the North Country."

One of the more local charities that the Rotary Club is looking to benefit through this event is a program being run through the Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks. The program is designed to get students more involved in nature and the Rotary club feels that this program will help get students more interested in the natural world around them.

Along with the Rotary Club, other groups and organizations have come together to help organize this event and make it successful. Money and equipment donations have allowed the Rotary club to make this event as sophisticated and organized as possible.

"The local VFW and the American Legion have donated money to purchase a photo finish system," Duval said. "It has a fully automatic timing system which allows us to capture images up to 1/100th of a second."

Even though this event is being held in Tupper Lake, organizers are hoping to attract participants from many different regions in the surrounding area.

"We have been e-mailing athletic directors at colleges and high schools, and we are hoping to get folks as far down as Albany and far up in the North Country," Merrihew says.

While this may be only the first year for the track meet, the Rotary Club is hoping that the event will track enough attention to allow this to become an annual event.

"We are hoping to jog enough interest and that people will like what we are doing so that we can keep doing this year after year," Duval says.

Are you going to particpate in the Rotary Summer Open?