ROAD RUNNING JOE CONCANNON; FREEDOM TRAIL'S SIMPLE TRADITION
Concannon, Joe. "Road Running Joe Concannon; Freedom Trail's Simple Tradition."
The initial race was best described as chaotically successful.
The field included Bill Rodgers, Jerome Drayton and Frank Shorter. The press bus turned the corner by the Bunker Hill Monument in Charlestown and found itself stuck behind two Sunday morning tourist buses. Randy Thomas, who would finish second, alertly led the runners onto the sidewalk and past the jam.
The traffic on the down ramp off the Expressway was backed up. Motorists trying to catch flights at Logan Airport became enraged. Bill Squires, who was coach of the Greater Boston Track Club and was serving as a marshal, was pummeled by a woman wielding an umbrella; it seems her flight to San Antonio was drawing near. A man threatened Squires with a tire iron.
This was the way it was Oct. 2, 1977, when Rodgers won the inaugural 8- mile Freedom Trail Road Race, with its start and finish by Waterfront Park and its course through the North End, Charlestown, Cambridge and the Back Bay.
Conceived as a fund-raiser for the burgeoning GBTC in the first crest of the running boom, it has ridden the waves and aged gracefully.
The 7th Freedom Trail race will start Sunday at 10 a.m., with Rod Dixon the prohibitive favorite and a record field of close to 4000. Therein lies the beauty of this race. Dixon will run here because he runs for Saucony, and it is the primary sponsor. There is modest prize money, but there is no attempt to outbid anybody for the top talent.
There was the memorable race of 1979, when Rodgers and Alberto Salazar were a part of what may have been the year's best field, and Salazar - despite a wrong turn - won it. In 1981, when Omni magazine bankrolled the race, there was $28,000 in upfront prize money, and Dixon and Anne Audain provided a New Zealand double. The era of prize money was dawning.
The 7th Freedom Trail race is a glowing example of how the races that are the bedrocks of the sport need not worry about the glitter of star talent. This is a race, pure and simple, followed by a giant block party in Boston'sfinancial district.
"If they had an underrated list," says running maven Tommy Leonard, "that party would be one of the top events. Of all the apres-race parties, it's far and away the best one.
"That's one race that deserves a permanent sponsor. It's well- orchestrated, it's for the runners and families, and it's tastefully done. It doesn't have the depth in terms of star quality, but that would go against the philosophy. This is one race that benefits the runners instead of the charities. Some charities beat running to death, and you never see a financial statement."
Tom Grilk, a corporate counsel who now lives in Lynnfield but was a member of a major downtown Boston law firm in 1977, and Don Facey, whose Cambridge printing firm does the numbers for many of the nation's top races, have been two of the prime movers of this GBTC race since its inception, and they've seen the evolution of the race and the sport.
"They say still waters run deep," says Grilk. "You also have the rushing rivers that have already passed their course. We've rolled with the evolution of the sport. We started off with the first wave, throwing money at people. Wewent the heavy prize-money route. In a sense, you can follow the progress of the sport itself through this race.
"This race is Dixon against the world. It'd be nice if there were a second person. But first and foremost, we want this to be a nice race for a lot of people.
"Rather than being a flashy product of a lot of money, we're a people's race. Falmouth is a strong event on its own merit. The people who put this on and the ones who put on Falmouth have a commitment to an event, not to a public relations extravaganza."
The arrangement with Saucony is the same as it was with sponsors Labatts in 1977 and 1978, Hood in 1979 and Omni in 1981. "The sponsor assumes the expense," says Grilk. "The entry fees are used for the same purposes they were always used for. The runners. Maybe we've gone full cycle, too. There are still a lot of people who want developing."
Runners such as Rodgers, Salazar, Joan Benoit and Greg Meyer run for shoe companies. The Greater Boston TC once was home for Rodgers, Salazar, Meyer, Bobby Hodge, Thomas and Squires. They've gone their separate ways, but the race they were a part of in its infancy survives rather well, thank you.
"We were paying our own way when this started, and we couldn't find an American company to sponsor us," says Squires. "We ended up in that third year with $500,000 worth of talent coming here for $15,000 total in expenses. Guys who got $300 to $500 then can command $3000 to $7000 now. But I've always said it only takes two to make a race. If you have 23 names, who reads past third?"
Squires now wears a rug that would cushion the blows of a woman's umbrella, but there should be no problems with traffic patterns. They've been worked out with city and MDC officials. There is a stretch on Commonwealth avenue that is torn up, and that segment of the race will be rerouted down Marlborough street.
There is a wedding reception scheduled for 11 a.m. at a restaurant on the course on the waterfront area. The start will take the field past its doors, the finish will do the same.
"The manager said, I guess I'm in trouble.' I said, You're in big trouble,' " said Facey. "We told him the guests can start coming in at 11 and walk gingerly across the street," said Grilk. Yes, the Freedom Trail is here to stay.
Copyright Boston Globe Newspaper Sep 30, 1983
There won't be an 11th annual Freedom Trail Road Race this fall.
The 8-mile run through Boston's historic sites, scheduled for Oct. 4, fell victim to a lack of sponsorship.
John Heffernan, president of the Greater Boston Track Club, said the club is actively seeking both a sponsor and event management company to revive the race for 1988.