Running News Daily

Kenmore’s Liam Hilbert who first ran Turkey Trot at age 9 wins annual race

When Kenmore’s Liam Hilbert says it’s a lifelong dream to win a YMCA Turkey Trot, he isn’t kidding.

Hilbert has run the trot for 15 consecutive years in what has become a family tradition, but he’s only 23. His first one was at 9 years old.

He now has that victory after winning Thursday’s 8K race in 24 minutes, 43 seconds.

After a year in which the in-person field was restricted by Covid-19 protocols, more than 12,000 runners and walkers took to Delaware Avenue for the 126th edition of what is billed as the longest consecutively run footrace in North America.

University of Wisconsin runner and Nardin graduate Danielle Orie topped the women’s field in 27:57. Orie was home for Thanksgiving break after running in the NCAA Division I Championships last weekend.

Hilbert is a former Monsignor Martin champion in the 1,600 meters and 3,000 meters at St. Joe’s and went to run at the University at Buffalo. He was the Mid-American Conference outdoor champion in the 10,000 meters last spring.

Hilbert ran the race with his uncle, James Waldron, with whom he had run the his first few Turkey Trots.

“My family was there to cheer me on,” Hilbert said.

Buffalo’s Thomas Appenheimer was second in 24:27, followed by Steven Haagsma of Gowanda (25:00), Rush’s Brennan Root (25:09) and Rochester’s Paul Suflita (25:28). Appenheimer runs at Canisius College and finished 11th in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference championships last month. Haagsma is a former Division III runner at Calvin College in Michigan.

For Orie, it’s been a busy fall in her first year at Wisconsin.

Orie ran for Penn as an undergraduate and transferred in the spring as she pursues her law degree. She finished 25th in the Big Ten Championships and then 22nd in the Great Lakes Region championship to qualify for the NCAAs. She finished 112th, covering the 6K in 20:34.2. Wisconsin finished 12th in the nation.

Sarah Danner of Gowanda was second in 28:21, followed by Pittsburgh’s Margo Malone in 28:38, Alexandra Cadicamo in 28:58 and Glenwood’s Aileen Hoak-Lange in 29:16.

Hoak-Lange, in her 29th consecutive trot, was the top woman in last year’s event as she was selected among 125 in-person runners.

(11/26/2021) Views: 1,256 ⚡AMP
by Robert Kirkham / Buffalo News

Be ready for the 126th Annual YMCA Turkey Trot

There are still spots left to participate in the 126th Annual YMCA Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving Day in Buffalo. 

Race organizers say there a few spots remaining, but they believe they will reach the 12,000 capacity before Thanksgiving.

The 8k course begins on Delaware Avenue in North Buffalo and finishes downtown near the Buffalo Niagara Convention Center. 

Pre-race packet pickup will take place Monday, Nov. 22 through Wednesday Nov. 24 at the Independent Health Family Branch Y located at 150 Tech Drive in Amherst near the ECC North Campus.  

Runners can pick up their packets daily between 10:00 am and 7:00 pm on those days.  It is recommended to pick up your packet prior to race day.  

However, if you can't pick up your packet, before the race, you can pick it up on Thanksgiving Day between 7:00 am and 8:30 am at the Delaware Family YMCA.

If you cannot run in person, you can participate in the virtual Turkey Trot between Thursday, Nov. 25 and Sunday, Nov. 28. 

As always, in-race participants are invited to take part in the Annual Costume Contest before the event. Contestants need to be ready to take the stage in front of the Delaware Family YMCA at 8:25 a.m. Prizes will be awarded for best group and individual costumes. 

Proceeds from the YMCA Turkey Trot help fund Y programs that empower youth and improve community health.

If you are participating, you are asked to remember to bring your ID, wristband and mask during the race. 

(11/22/2021) Views: 1,177 ⚡AMP

The Oldest Continuous Road Race In The World, YMCA Buffalo Turkey Trot 8-K, Will Be Held For A Record 125th Straight Year This Year

Each year on Thanksgiving Day more Americans participate in running races than on any other day.  According to the running industry trade group Running USA, about 1.2 million Americans ran in a “turkey trot” in 2018, up 71% from 2011 when the organization first began tracking participation.  It’s the perfect activity before families sit down to their Thanksgiving feasts and hours of watching football.

“As the popularity of turkey trots grows, we increasingly see them as healthy activities for the whole family on one of the biggest holidays of the year,” observed outgoing Running USA CEO Rich Harshbarger through a statement in 2019.  “The vast majority of participants are running with partners, children, other family members, friends, and even multi-generational branches of their family tree.”

But the pandemic will put a huge dent in race participation on Thanksgiving this year which falls on Thursday, November 26.  Out of a representative sample of 39 well-established turkey trots tracked by Race Results Weekly, only six plan to stage in-person races this year.  The rest will be held virtually, or have simply been cancelled.

Among those six, are two of the nation’s oldest road races, the YMCA Turkey Trot 8-K in Buffalo, N.Y., founded in 1896, and the Run for the Diamonds (9 miler) in Berwick, Pa., founded in 1908.  Remarkably, the Buffalo race has been held for 124 consecutive years without being cancelled, making it the longest running public road race in the world.  It was actually founded one year before the Boston Marathon.

So when the pandemic struck last March, race director Rick Streeter quickly began thinking about how to put on the 125th edition as a safe, in-person race.  Streeter, a vice-president at Leone Timing, the event management and timing company which oversees the operation of the race, felt strongly that the streak should continue.  He and Leone Timing’s president Pat Leone started to look for a way forward.

“We knew that we needed to do something live,” Streeter told Race Results Weekly in a telephone interview earlier this week.  “Obviously, with some of our success with virtual racing in the spring, we were going to have that component, regardless.  But to preserve the record, the streak, we needed to do something live.”

Working with leaders at the YMCA Buffalo Niagara Association, the not-for-profit organization which owns the event, Streeter and Leone proposed a hybrid race with most athletes running virtually, but 125 –one for each year of the race‘s tenure– could run in-person.  YMCA officials, with support from Erie County and the City of Buffalo, liked the idea but how would the 125 be selected?  The race is extremely popular, and had almost 12,000 finishers last year.  After a lot of discussion, they decided to select the runners randomly out of the pool of virtual entrants.

The traditional point-to-point course allowed the event to accommodate a large group of runners, but it also meant that runners had to be transported to the start.  Streeter wanted to eliminate that requirement.

“We had to create a new course because we didn’t want it to be point-to-point,” Streeter explained.  “We wanted to eliminate the transportation factor, so everybody is in charge of their own transportation.  It’s not a common start/finish (line), but the start and finish are very close.”

Of course, many runners may show up on the traditional course to do their virtual races on Thanksgiving, something that Streeter and Leone have anticipated.  They made sure that the special 2020 course isn’t in the same location as the traditional course.

“I think the idea is getting the in-person race onto a different course and getting them out of the way of what may happen unofficially on the regular course,” said Leone.

“Actually, it was the one thing we talked about right from March when everything locked down,” Leone said.  “I said, if I’ve got to gather five or ten people we’ve got to have the 125th… if we have to run them one at a time down the sidewalk into downtown to the convention center.”  He continued: “We felt like we are stewards of it, something that survived world wars, all the world wars, and whatever else.”

Leone and Streeter noted that the race came close to cancellation a few times, including in both 2000 and 2014 when early snowstorms hit the city hard just before Thanksgiving.  The city, and race officials and volunteers, were up to the challenge.  In 2000 the race recorded 3452 finishers, and in 2000 there were 12,280.

(11/05/2020) Views: 1,264 ⚡AMP
by David Monti

10 Reasons to Run a Turkey Trot

Thanksgiving is the most popular running day of the year, according to Running USA. Last year more than 1.17 million people registered for a Turkey Trot around the Thanksgiving holiday. The tradition is believed to have started in 1896 in Buffalo, New York, with Y.M.C.A. Buffalo Niagara’s Turkey Trot —  today the 8K attracts more than 14,000 runners and calls itself the “oldest consecutively run footrace in North America.”

While running a few miles won’t do much to offset the 2,000+ calories you’re likely to consume on Thanksgiving, there are plenty of other reasons to lace up your sneakers and get moving with family and friends.

1.- It’s one of those rare unicorn events that everyone can actually do together, whether you run, walk or trot. Win points with your Ironman father-in-law. Or just use it an excuse to be better at something (anything!) than your cousin.

2.- On the other hand, if you get stressed by family dynamics, a Turkey Trot can also be a great excuse to escape. (Self-care, hello?!?!?)

3.- Most races have shorter distances for kids, everything from a 1-miler to a 500-meter dash — often with mini-medals, chocolate lollipops or hot apple cider at the finish.

4.- You can probably get out of some holiday-related jobs/duties/tasks — peeling potatoes, putting the leaf in the dining room table, getting folding chairs from your uncle’s garage — because you will be at the race (and going to/coming from/showering after!).

5.- If you’re traveling to that same relative’s house for the fifth year in a row, consider finding a race in a nearby town (Active.com has a comprehensive list); a new environment can keep things interesting.

6.- Make fun of the (probably ugly) shirt that will go straight into your pajama drawer because it features the face of a massive cartoon turkey or the name of a local pub. (Why are Turkey Trot race shirts so universally bad?) 

7.- Feel morally superior to everyone else when you post your Turkey Trot pic on social media or feel less lazy (and avoid FOMO) when everyone else posts theirs.

8.- Enjoy an extra helping of stuffing.

9.- If you do post a pic, use #WillTrotForBeer and tag @MichelobULTRA — until December 1 the brand will donate $1 per pic (up to $10,000) to AmpleHarvest.org, a non-profit aiming to end food waste and hunger.

10.- Appease guilt on Friday when you don’t work out because you’re still full/busy shopping/watching Christmas movies/eating another slice of pie.

(11/26/2019) Views: 1,931 ⚡AMP
by Stephanie Emma Pfeffer

Turkey Trots On Thanksgiving, Is one of the most popular days of the year to race

If you think about it, the Turkey Trot makes perfect sense. It unites the caloric extravaganza that is Thanksgiving with the calorie-torching activity that is running. Perhaps that’s why in 2015, Thanksgiving eclipsed the Fourth of July as the most popular day to run a race, drawing nearly a million participants to more than 1,000 different events across the country. But while the Turkey Trot’s popularity is a modern phenomenon, its origins stretch all the way back to 1896. The inaugural trot took place 122 years ago in Buffalo, New York. The 8K cross-country race, hosted by the local YMCA that Thanksgiving Day, drew just six participants, and only four of them made it to the finish line. This year, more than a dozen turkey trots are taking place on Thanksgiving in Colorado. From Durango to Greeley to Colorado Springs, it’s a hugely popular day to run. The state’s biggest race, the Mile High United Way turkey trot, attracts more than 8,000 runners and walkers each year.  One of the largest is the Turkey Trot in San Jose California.   (11/21/2018) Views: 1,532 ⚡AMP