[Author’s Note: This article is the first in an 11-part series in AJW’s Taproom celebrating under the radar races.]
Every July, Letchworth State Park in Western New York state is house to the Many on the Genny, a 45-mile path race that traverses the park and runs alongside each side of the gorge created by the raging Genesee River.
Letchworth State Park itself is a beloved park. Nicknamed the “Grand Canyon of the East,” it encompasses 17 miles of the Genesee River and was named America’s greatest state park within the 2015 “USA Immediately” Readers’ Selection Awards.
The brainchild of race administrators Eric and Sheila Eagan, Many on the Genny is billed as:
“A 45-ish-mile path extremely utilizing each side of the well-known gorge in Letchworth State Park. With 90% of the course off roads, you’ll traverse singletrack, fields, foot bridges, and bridle paths. You’ll expertise lovely vistas, quad busting climbs, and most significantly a grassroots, neighborhood pleasant occasion. Within the fashion of old-fashioned ultras, this race comes with a necessity for self-sufficient runners.”
Runners out on the Many on the Genny course. Photograph: Ron Heerkens Jr
Domestically owned and operated by the nonprofit TrailsRoc group, all proceeds from Many on the Genny are donated again to the park to assist path constructing and upkeep. As well as, Eric and Sheila cap the race at 150 runners and don’t enable pacers as they attempt to reduce the affect of the occasion on the park trails. Lastly, all the occasion is totally staffed by unpaid volunteers from the local people. It’s a tried-and-true grassroots occasion.
The Eagans grew up going to the park, and after a cross-country journey that they had deliberate was unexpectedly canceled, they determined to spend per week climbing and working each inch of the park. They invited members of the native path neighborhood to hitch them for morning and night outings and have been amazed that folks got here to hitch them day by day.
By the top of the week, Sheila exclaimed, “Ya’ know, there actually ought to be an occasion that may showcase what we simply noticed, the hidden trails, the key waterfalls, the highest of the gorge to the underside of the canyon, all of it.”
And with that, they went house, taped collectively a map of the sections, and Many on the Genny was born.
Eric notes that, like several occasion, Many on the Genny shouldn’t be with out its challenges. There are distant sections of the park that usually want vital path work earlier than the occasion, because the gorge ferns develop like a rain forest in the summertime and overtake the path.
There may be additionally a dam for flood management, and there are occasions when the dam is closed, and components of the course are submerged underwater. Lastly, there may be additionally little to no cellular phone protection, and in some locations the park police radios don’t even work, so the organizers and park officers have to work collectively as a bunch to care and be careful for one another.
I requested Eric what he most seems to be ahead to on race day, and he shared with me the occasion’s most unusual custom:
“We ask that all the runners write thanks notes for every of the 5 support stations. The spotlight of the day for us is as every support station closes down, they collect all the notes, they sit collectively, and so they learn the notes out loud. Individuals cry, folks snort, folks smile. Runners will share how they overcame obstacles, how they give up ingesting, how that they had a objective to make it to every support station to provide thanks. New mothers have shared child tales, folks have written poems, and even carried out for our support stations. It’s a shifting a part of the occasion that we expect is particular and distinctive to us, and actually drives house what this complete sport is about.”
A volunteer greets a runner at considered one of Many on the Genny’s improbable support stations. Photograph: Ron Heerkens Jr
Lastly, waiting for the July 21, 2024, occasion, Eric notes that there are nonetheless just a few coveted spots out there on this yr’s race and registration continues to be open for many who wish to expertise this actually distinctive and particular occasion “below the radar.”
Bottoms up!
AJW’s Beer of the Week
This week’s beer of the week comes from Genesee Brewing Firm in Rochester, New York. One of many nation’s oldest breweries, Genesee launched Genesee Black Lager in 2018 and it’s excellent. Brewed within the traditional European fashion of black lagers, Black is a daring, full-flavored lager with a crisp, refreshing end.
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