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Millennium Mile
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Sports - December 29, 2001 TWO DAYS before the third annual Union Leader Millenium Mile, race director John Mortimer already was looking ahead to next year. “I think we can draw 1,000 people,” the Londonderry native-turned-Goffstown resident said yesterday. “Think about it: We get 500 adult runners and 500 kids. I think we can do it.” Tomorrow’s race, which takes place in Londonderry at 2 p.m., is expected to draw between 250 and 300 runners to the downhill mile on Mammoth Road. Among them will be several former college All-Americans, including the Downin brothers, reigning USA Track and Field 1,500-meter champion Andy and 2000 national fall cross country champ Matt, former Hampstead residents who share race-directiring chores with their friend Mortimer. Also in the field will be younger participants, some of them elementary school students who participate in local running programs, others children who simply want to take part in a race at a manageable distance. If enough kids show up, they’ll get to run their own race. If the numbers aren’t there, the kids will get to run along with — OK, behind — some of the best runners in the country. Mortimer, 24, is convinced everyone who runs in tomorrow’s race — the elite, the kids and those who are neither very fast nor very young — will have a good enough time to return next year. Who’s going to argue with him? His bid for a likely berth on the 2000 Olympic team curtailed by a series of knee operations behind him, his battle with a liver ailment ongoing, the seven-time All-American at the University of Michigan continues to run marathons while working for a Cambridge, Mass., architecture firm and serving as an assistant cross country and track coach at Harvard. Three weeks ago, Mortimer ran his latest 26.2-miler in Honolulu, and placed 55th in a field of almost 20,000, crossing the finish line in 2 hours 52 minutes 1 second. Get 1,000 people to run a mile downhill on a December afternoon in Londonderry next year? Yeah, he can do that. Vin Sylvia is Deputy Managing Editor for Sports of The Union Leader and
New Hampshire Sunday News. His e-mail address is vsylvia@theunionleader.com |
Millennium Mile |
