Josh stars abound, but look ahead to snowBy John Hitchcock
12:00AM / Wednesday, September 17, 2003
 | | Hundreds of athletes, young and old, participated in this year's JoshView Slide Show |
Sunday’s 27th annual running of the Great Josh Billings RunAground epitomized the spirit of true amateur competition, with the winning team led by New Hampshire’s 53-year-old attorney general, Peter Heed.
His team, the Prodigal Sons, also won in 1981, ’83 and ’89, with only Heed a member in all triumphs.
The 342 teams, ranging from four members down to one, represented top athletes from all over the Northeast and Quebec, as well as first-time entrants.
The Sons completed the 40 miles of biking, canoeing and running from the start in Great Barrington to the finish at Tanglewood in 2 hours, 17 minutes and 45 seconds.
First-timers Jane and Robert Miller and Dawn and Bill Guild, all of Williamstown, finished last in 4:33:44, but their sense of satisfaction probably matched the feelings of Heed, Dana Henry, Makunda Feldman and Greg Hammett.
Some competitors were in their 60s, including Steve Moore of West Stockbridge, who has been in every single Josh. And then there was Lenox tot Laura Spector, daughter of Josh Director Patty Spector. Only 15, Laura is already a renowned athlete, an outstanding high school cross country runner and skier, as well as an experienced triathlete.
Laura was entered in the “iron maiden” category, doing it all alone. And she won in 2:58:22, defeating past champion Gloria Wesley of Pittsfield, almost 30 years older.
Pat Weaver, 34 who skied and ran for Lenox High some 20 years ago and made the Nordic team for the 1998 Winter Olympics at Nagano, Japan, was on the second-place team Sunday, the Berkshire combine named Bold, Bolder and Boldest. The team trailed the winners by 49 seconds.
Weaver made a strong showing at the 1995 World University Games in Spain, helping him win a spot on the U.S. National Team in 1996, followed by the Nagano Olympics, where his father suffered a stroke just before Pat participated in the four-member relay race, with the team finishing 17th. Pat’s best individual showing in Japan was a 40th.
The U.S. Nordic program was sharply curtailed after the ’98 Games, and Pat was not included on the team at the 2002 Olympics in Utah.
With reduced training last winter, Pat had two fifths, a sixth and a seventh at last year’s Nationals in Rumford, Maine, and he plans to be back in Rumford next January for the 2004 Nationals.
Weaver said he has never met Laura Spector and hoped that he would see her at the Josh.
“With the ski academies, they are training kids at a younger age compared to my days, when college skiing was usually the first intensive training,” said Weaver. But he noted that cross-country skiing is a lifetime activity with many winners well into their 20s or 30s.
He still enjoys skiing at Kennedy Park with its “challenging” trails, as well as at Hickory Hill in Worthington, Notch View in Windsor and Prospect Mountain in Woodford, Vt., with its “reliable snow.”
Bret Bedard of Cheshire has attended the Stratton Mountain Ski School for two years and is considered one of the top young racers in the East.
Laura Spector dominated the Berkshire high school XC and running events the past year, but is now a student at Green Mountain Academy in Waitsfield, Vt., where ski training is combined daily with academics.
During the Josh, Weaver was leading for the first half of the six-mile run from Stockbridge Bowl to the main gate at Tanglewood when the Prodigal’s Hammett took over. Weaver’s teammates were runner Bret Williamson and canoeists Bob Zube and Bob Rapant.
Since graduating from the University of New Hampshire, Weaver has trained throughout the ski world, spending the past several years at Mount Bachelor in Bend, Ore.
Whenever he was near the Berkshires, Weaver would enter various local events, including the Berkshire Outfitters’ annual roller ski and skate race to the summit of Mount Greylock, which he won last October.
Weaver had been partially sponsored by Home Depot the last four years, but last year was hired by the Atomic Ski Co. to develop and promote its products. He is living this year near UNH and plans to enter next month’s roller ski event.
Born in Germany, where his father, Dr. Terry Weaver, was stationed with the military, the Weavers then settled in Lenox, where Pat first raced for Lenox High at Kennedy Park (where there is a trail named in his honor).
He was an All-American at UNH and concentrated on making the national team for the next 10 years.
The only other local skier to make the Olympic Nordic Team was Jim Curran of Stamford, Vt., who skied for Drury High in North Adams and became interested in serious racing after graduating from the University of Vermont. He skied the 50-kilometer event at the 1992 Olympics in France.
On the snow, skiing will not happen for several weeks, although Telluride, Colo., picked up 8 inches the other night, when two people were trapped in their car for 48 hours during a Rocky Mountain blizzard.
Ice skating, however, is now available at the Vietnam War Veterans Rink in North Adams and should come along soon at the rinks in Pittsfield and Manchester, Vt.
A power-skating clinic will start Thursday at the North Adams rink and will continue through Sept. 23. Laura Stamm will direct the program. Call 802-694-1620 or e-mail: elistu@sover.net.
Registration for the Northern Berkshire Youth Hockey League will take place Sept. 25 from 5 to 7 p.m. at the North Adams rink; call Mike Bloom at 664-4163.
Among the veteran champions at area golf courses are Andrew Congdon of Great Barrington, winner for the 16th time at Wyantenuck, and Leo Romanos Jr. at Forest Park in Adams.
Golfing is at its peak now and should continue that way until the falling leaves cover the fairways.
John Hitchcock of Williamstown writes frequently about the area sports scene.
|
