Folks might not know Volte well, but when they do they often know us by what we do.
That starts with our founder Bill Dwyer, who recently celebrated a birthday that moves him into a new age group. (We'll let him tell you which one! ~ NV)
As Bill transitioned from a very good local age group racer into coaching groups and individuals, a twice-monthly 5K came on to the scene in 2000 -- Run The Woodlands 5K.
For the majority of six years, it was produced by Massachusetts transplant Don Drewniak.
Towards the end of 2006, when Don was going to retire in Delaware, an agreement was reached for Luke's Locker to assume the operations of the race.
The oldest of old timers knew it as "The Dollar Race" - a time trial course that started and finished at Barbara Bush Elementary in The Woodlands.
Sometime between the second and fourth Saturday of this month, Luke's Locker, facing some financial challenges, closed The Woodlands store on a Friday and filed for Chapter 11 protection the following Tuesday.
The latter coming just four days before the fourth Saturday of January.
Over the years, a couple of races - primarily when it landed on the same day as Ten For Texas - were cancelled.
But otherwise, even through a couple of hurricanes and a Christmas Day race that Bill and Volte friend Jon Walk produced, most of the 384 available Saturdays since January 2000 have seen a race from the elementary school parking lot.
The day after the news reported Luke's Locker filed for Chapter 11, Bill reached out to Mike Lucas, who had recently moved to the Dallas area after being in charge of The Woodlands location since its opening.
He received permission on Friday from Luke's Locker to be able to keep the race going until it was decided who would handle future races as the company went through Chapter 11 proceedings.
And while there weren't any Volte runners on Saturday, the great running community of The Woodlands, the rest of Montgomery County and surrounding areas and clubs have been a great encouragement to Volte - and have supported us.
(And, for the record, Volte did not mention or promote itself at the race site on race day.)
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| Run The Woodlands 5K start (Photo courtesy of Lindsay Perkins) |
Chris Larson - 19:19, Kevin Baker - 19:41, Gary Boerner - 20:16, Parker Jolly - 20:26, Christopher Johnson - 20:28, Troy Joyal - 21:56, J.Nathan Overstreet - 23:12, Brian Duncan - 23:32, Tim Rus - 24:09, Pani Challa - 24:22, Zach Taylor - 25:34, Katerina Savelieva - 25:41, Geoff May - 27:07, Vince Attanucci - 27:15, Dianne Dixon - 29:08, Gant Austin - 29:09, Richard Heestand - 33:32, Mathew Darla - 34:57, Tom Pinney - 36:04, Josh Parker - 37:45, Gavin Berry - 49:07, Kela Berry - 49:07, Brenda Berry - 49:07, Pamela Jaszkowiak - 49:40
Volte's Layton Gill and Volte friend Lindsay Perkins volunteered. Runners whose names are bolded won the race's traditional post-race drawings.
Gavin Berry went off course (was in 4th at the time) and ended up going an estimated five miles. When he returned to the course he met up with his mom (Brenda) and sister (Kela) and finished with them. He was announced as the winner of the first ever RTW 5-miler. :-)
One of the other things that we feel very strongly about in Volte, USA is our group's diversity.
Geographic, nationality, ethnic and spiritual diversity is embraced and - as evidenced this past weekend - athletic.
While we're run-focused, our team and our friends tend to enjoy challenging themselves.
952 steps. That's how many it was to the top of the Tower of the Americas, reported Volte's Sandra Tezino and Lauren Hoffart.
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| Lauren and Sandra's view of what they would soon climb! (Photo courtesy of Sandra Tezino) |
It was a one-mile run followed by a 64-flight climb of stairs.
"We did it!," exclaimed Hoffart while Tezino added that it was "a new experience for a great cause."
Lauren completed the one-mile run in 7:31 while taking 11 minutes to climb the tallest building in San Antonio and the 27th tallest building in Texas.
Tezino eclipsed Hoffart's total time of 18:32 by a minute and four seconds, finishing in 17:28.
"My age group was 41-50 and I had the best mile in my age group (6:29) but those stairs were a different kind of beast," Sandra remarked as she was fifth overall in her age group after a 10:59 minute climb of her own. "It was fun and I am glad I did it. You know I will start practicing stairs now, for next year's challenge."
Marta Mixa closed the books on Saturday with a 27:46 early afternoon performance at the Conroe Tiger Band Color Fun Run 5K. This after a 7-mile group run earlier in the morning.
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| A little color is all good for Marta Mixa! (Photo courtesy of Marta Mixa) |
George Rux and Bonnie Scholz didn't let it bother them at the Du The Polar Bear Duathlon in Cy-Fair. Both placed in their age group in the 2-mile run, 10-mile bike and 2-mile run race.
George was first in his age group in 1:05:35 while Bonnie grabbed second in hers in 1:08:25.
Out west in the first race of the 2017 Texas 10 Series in Boerne, our small team all did well.
Brayden Park was the first finisher in the Lil' Tex Kids' 1-Mile race.
Penny Garza boasted a four-minute and 20-second PR at the 10-mile distance from November with her 1:46:18 effort, a 10-minute improvement from the same course as last year.
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| Hope Jimenez and Jerritt Park earned some glasses to fill in Boerne. (Photo courtesy of Alan Ramsey) |
Closer to home, Will Ott and Criss Neumann raced the primarily flat Fort Bend Kia Half Marathon that was part of the USA Fit Marathon in Sugar Land.
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| Will Ott closes on the Fort Bend Kia Half Marathon finish line first. (Photo courtesy of Bill Dwyer) |
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| Criss Neumann is all smiles after wrapping up a solid race in Sugar Land. (Photo courtesy of Bill Dwyer) |
Jon's race reports from the weekend are as follows: Temple, Angleton and Sugar Land.
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