When 3,000 racers and their friends and family show up for the ninth annual New Albany Walking Classic on the morning of Sept. 8, everything will be ready for them.
Metal fences will line the start and end of the course, ensuring that only those registered participate. Stations along the route will have cups of water ready for thirsty walkers. More than 150 musicians, cheerleaders and gymnasts will be poised to entertain those on both the 10K and half marathon routes.
It’s all thanks to about 500 volunteers who help out with the Walk each year – and behind the volunteers is a group of about 25 dedicated people who assist Walk founder Phil Heit in organizing the New Albany signature event.
“They are a dedicated group,” Heit says of the core team he calls “the committee.” “That’s the lifeline to the event. People take their volunteer responsibilities very, very seriously, and while there’s a lot of work, we try to be respectful of their time.”
The entire group meets just three times a year – though they do communicate outside these meetings with each other and with Heit on an individual basis – and each of those meetings is only an hour long.
“It’s kind of amazing for an event as complete as ours,” Heit says.
His right-hand helper for the Walk is Kristin Ferguson, director of marketing for Healthy New Albany. Ferguson, who is paid an hourly wage, is the event’s (and the organization’s) only paid employee.
“I finally had to do that because I just couldn’t do everything myself anymore,” Heit says.
Ferguson, always an avid walker in her personal life, participated in the walk from its inception until five years ago, when she began coordinating the volunteers.
“I was a friend of someone who was working on it previously and … she recommended that I get involved,” Ferguson says. “I was just happy to help. She ended up moving away and I took over her position. … At the same time I was the team mom for the (New Albany High School) football team, so I had the ear of the coach.”
Ferguson recruited the 120 members of the football teams as volunteers and began working with other high school coaches to make similar arrangements for their teams. Now 200 to 300 student volunteers begin arriving at 6 a.m. to unload 7,000 bottles of water from Kroger, set up trash cans and merchant tables in Market Square, and volunteer at the merchant booths, helping to hand out refreshments.
“The kids get a T-shirt, they get community service hours and they love it,” she says. “They come back every year to do it for us.”
Other young New Albany residents have a chance to help out with the Walk by providing entertainment along the 6.2- and 13.1-mile courses. Greg Gould, owner of GNG Music Instruction and Walk entertainment coordinator, arranged for about 30 of his students and 35 instructors – many of whom are from New Albany – to perform during the walk. In addition, local bands, groups from New Albany Middle School and High School, and the New Albany Symphony and the Easton Lululemon store also cheer on walkers through the neighborhood streets.
This year, Gould plans to include more entertainment along the half marathon route, which is more remote and runs along Dublin-Granville, Kitzmiller and Smith’s Mill roads.
“It’s fun, and the weather is always beautiful, but it can be kind of monotonous, so the entertainment kind of breaks up the walk and gives people something to focus on and get excited about,” says Gould, who has been working on the entertainment portion of the race for three years. “It’s good exposure for the New Albany community of what’s going on in the arts.”
Volunteers also run the New Albany Walking Classic Expo, which is held the two days before the race – 4-8 p.m. Sept. 6 and 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Sept. 7 this year at the Jeanne B. McCoy Community Center for the Arts, 100 E. Dublin-Granville Rd. The Expo, which allows for pre-race packet pick up, features vendors offering health screenings as well as the chance to purchase Walking Classic merchandise.
“It’s a fantastic event,” says Karen Edwards, a member of the New Albany Walking Club. Edwards has organized the volunteer efforts for the Expo for the last five years. “You can learn a lot about your health and your body before you participate in the race.”
She coordinates scheduling for the 50-75 volunteers needed for the two-day Expo. Thirty to 35 work the Friday evening shift with 20 to 30 at a time working Saturday shifts. On Expo days, Linda Romanoff assists Edwards with set up, including preparing the tables full of race goody bags.
At a July planning meeting for this year’s race, the group went over registration (sold out!), security (volunteers keeping an eye on the fences at the entrance) and monitoring of the half-marathon course (taken on by volunteer bicyclists who make sure walkers stay hydrated and safe), among other topics. In spite of the large group – approximately 20 of the 25 volunteers were in attendance – they buzzed through the list of topics and wrapped up their meeting 15 minutes early, leaving enough time for Heit to give them a reward for their hard work: technical shirts with “New Albany Walking Classic” written in rainbow neon.
Lisa Aurand is editor of Healthy New Albany Magazine. Feedback welcome at laurand@cityscenemediagroup.com.
New Albany Walking Classic
8 a.m, Sept. 8
Market Square
www.NewAlbanyWalkingClassic.com
