A Race is Really Not About the Awards (Part 3)

In case you're just popping in and you missed it...I'm writing all about the various lessons I learned while directing a small local 5K called the Give it Back Track.

I was asked with only a few months to go until race day to direct a local 5K. The race is put on by the Huntsville Inner City Learning Center so that the kids who attend the center can have the change to "give back" to the community that gives so much to them. The course starts about 1/2 mile from the Learning Center and finishes pretty much at it's front door.

Now I'm not sure what you think of when you hear the words "inner city" but I think of places like downtown Detroit or Chicago. The words that come to mind for me are poverty, crime, danger, and drugs. I don't really think of the Huntsville Alabama I am used to seeing, even though I drive past the housing projects on this course several times a month. I drive past them, I don't drive through them.

When I found out the course of this race runs in the heart of one of what I hope is the "worst" neighborhoods we have in our city, if I'm being completely honest, I panicked. MY name would be on the race permit. My name would the one where it says "person responsible for putting this event on". If someone got hurt I would be the one a finger would be pointing too. I don't go into those neighborhoods for a reason.

And yet...some of the kids who attend the Learning Center LIVE in those neighborhoods. LIVE THERE EVERY DAY. Sleep there. Wake up there. Spend weekends there. The ones who don't live in the race course neighborhoods live in areas like them.

LIVE THERE. They don't just drive past and they don't just run through.


When I started my own non-profit, one of my biggest goals was to bring low income kids into the sport of triathlon in order to teach them life skills needed to persevere in life. Mental and physical strength. Endurance. Integrity. Moxie. My goal would be to get kids in neighborhoods like these and give them some of the skills they need to be able to get out. And yet I found myself scared to event think about running through.

I was struck by that. If I wasn't willing to even go into the neighborhood how on earth could I think I would be able to impact the kids who live there. How can anyone truly help someone they refuse to actually SEE? Sure you can give money to a cause but until you are touched by it you can't fully connect with it. It's one thing to provide a meal for a kid, it's another to hear their stomach growl, and even yet another to go hungry yourself. It's one thing to donate a pair of shoes but quite another to see kids running in shoes that are too small (or too big because they haven't yet grown into them).

But I was struggling for so many reasons. One of the biggest reasons is that I did not (and still don't) think the race was the best way to accomplish it's MAIN goal. I was told the MAIN reason this race is put on is so that the kids can have the chance to know what it's like to give back.

But that's like saying kids raise the money in school fundraisers. Okay, maybe some of them do -- the ones who have a car wash or bake sale. But most kids' parents sell the crap the school has told them to peddle (cookie dough, sheets - yes, sheets! - wrapping paper, candy bards...the list goes on). The kids don't sell that stuff, the parents do. Then the kids get some little prize for how much the parents sell. For this race, historically, the organizer gets donations so that after all the bills are paid a check can be written to a non-profit. The kids aren't involved in the planning or the production of the race. They train to run it and then run it...that's about it. Well, they probably pose for a picture with the big check.

That was a big disconnect in my mind. I don't like when the thing you are doing isn't pushing you toward the goal you are trying to reach. It would be like saying I'm going to sit on a couch and watch someone else run to get ready for a marathon. ...it does't work like that.

But I also knew I didn't have time to do anything differently. I sort of tried, but I just wasn't going to be able to pull it off in the amount of time I had left.

Thanks for stopping in and sticking around...we are ALMOST there...

A Race is Really Not About the Awards (part 2)

If you are just popping in, you might want to read the back story to this post before moving on...unless you like starting a book part of the way in, or coming into a movie late.

But here's a little recap anyway...Daisy asked me to direct a local little 5K...for the Kids. Then she had me meet the director of the Huntsville Inner City Learning Center. Wow...that is one Godly man. He's wise (that is not code for "old"...) and he's probably one of the most affirming men I've ever met. He's not encouraging like a cheerleader. It's different. It's like he looks into your soul, sees all the good parts and then highlights them! But then she put the final nail in my coffin...she introduced me to the KIDS who go to the HICLC.

Oh these kids....they aren't your average bunch of kids. These kids have been taught, at the Learning Center, to be respectful and responsive. They aren't allowed to not engage in conversation with real words. They aren't allowed to fail in school. There are high expectations put on them and they are given the tools to succeed.

The schedule at the Learning Center is basically the same every day:

• arrive from school either via parent or HICLC "buses"
• physical activity or enrichment (art, music, dance, mindfulness...)
• Bible study 
• dinner
• homework
• parent pick up

They are amazing kids....and that sealed the deal. I almost heard God's audible voice..."say yes and I will give you the time and tools you need to get the job done". I found out that the kids actually pick the non-profit they give the money to which I truly felt like put me at a disadvantage because I wouldn't want to make a strong case for why MY organization should receive the money when I was the one directing the race. But I also didn't want anyone else making that case for us. It didn't matter at that point, I knew I was going to direct it no matter what because I was hooked on these kids. 

The organization the kids ultimately picked to receive the money was Graces of Gurley, an

organization that provides for the needs of children living the the Gurley area. It sounded like a super worthy cause but that did mean two things: 1) I was not going to be able to play a super active role in the fundraising aspect of the race because I am the ED of my own non-profit. It would get VERY difficult for me to go to a business and try to explain that...I'm the ED of OKT, I'm directing a race for HICLC that will donate money to GoG. Wait, what? So I talked to Daisy who said she would handle the fund raising aspect of the race.

I met with the the original RD's and the program director of HICLC early on to ask them if there were any aspects of the previous race they definitely wanted to keep. They all said no...other than running buddies would be recruited for each child for race day. I said it was my goal to get people to come to the LC to train with them too. But fairly quickly it became the mantra of the process that "this is the way it's always been done in the past". If I heard it once I heard it a hundred times. Everything from post race food to the colors on the tshirt. 

This created the platform for one of the biggest lessons I learned from directing this race. There can be only one leader. Well...you can have 2 co-leaders if you are committed to being in agreement with each other, but there can't be a panel of decision makers for every aspect of a race. It simply bogs down the whole process and everything becomes a discussion. And, with very little time to go until this race day, discussion couldn't be the norm of the day. Ultimately the director has to be in charge of the event. Because in the end the director will take the heat for any error that has been made.

I've always been reluctant to make decisions about things when someone else has a loud "voice". This comes from being someone who was taught early on that it was necessary to please people in power. Loud and firm voices typically come from people in charge. And, I have historically had a very hard time standing firm in the face of someone in authority (either real or perceived) over me. I crumble and I give in even when I believe I'm right. This doesn't make for the best race director. An RD is really just a problem solver. But, if a problem comes up and there are too many voices, the problem doesn't usually get solved, it just gets discussed.

I found out quickly that there were MANY aspects of this race that one person really wanted to keep in place. In fact, based on the number of times I heard "that's just they way it's always been done" I would say she wanted to keep everything EXACTLY the same as it had been. But why wasn't I told that from day one? Why was it implied that I would have the freedom to direct the race as I saw it needed to be directed? When I realized I didn't have the freedom to actually be the director I checked out a little bit. Not completely, I did still get some things done, but I didn't put my whole self into it because I felt like I was having my hands tied (true or not...that feeling felt real). Every decision began to feel like an uphill battle.

Added to that I had a fledgling program I was trying to get off the ground that I had to devote A LOT of attention to. And there were issues that were coming up with the marathon...big major issues that had to be dealt with.


And then I drove the course.

This course goes through parts of town I do not drive in much less run in. There is one small part that is the same as the marathon course (like 25 feet of the marathon course...). That one part caused me a lot of angst when we were videoing the course last year. We were riding our bikes along the course so I could produce one mile videos each week leading up to race day. We had to ride past that part a few times. Every time I would get a little nervous because it's an area that homeless people congregate. But this course is a running course. With kids. And that's NOT the worst part of the course. It crosses TRAIN TRACKS four times!! It runs past the tent cities, by the food bank, and through several Housing Project alley ways.

Then less than two months from race day there was a shooting in one of the housing projects on the course. 

I was told there had been like 4 shootings there in the last few months.

At that point I started having nightmares....

Thanks for stopping in and sticking around. Hang on, there's so much more...