SMAC BOD Meeting at Bement School Thursday, September 20, 2007

Present (Skeleton Crew, probably not a quorum): Bensen, Martula (Treasurer), Mazzola, Stone, Hunter, Henthorn.

Minutes: The minutes for May, June and August remain promised, "coming," even "imminent." July's were excellent, i.e. have been completed. And not by me.

Treasurer's Report: The Club earned $350 for its first place finish in the Master's division and third place in the Open at the Bridge of Flowers race. (For the record, the Open team comprised Chris Dickerson, Al Ladd, Rich Larsen, Derek Beard & Mike Townsley, with Aaron Stone and Sam Belcher as backup, while the Masters' crew was Dickerson, Ladd, Larsen, Ned James and Mark Mazzola, plus Dave Belcher and Sri Bodhke (Although Race Director Mike Hoberman finished between Rich and Ned, he seems to have overlooked that he's in SMAC too!). Go you SMAC runners!

Also, there have been some big payments to Jim Clayton for the Youth Track expenses. Sydney Henthorn was here to explain more (see below), but the consensus was: awesome! Sales of SMAC gear (jackets and socks) continue, and several present urged Mr. Martula to authorize the purchase of new adult singlets for resale, so that the geezers among us can at least buy uniforms as cool as those already available for the kids. Mark Mazzola will follow through with Northampton Running Company, and Sydney will ask for a show of interest at this year's last NoHo 5k race (Tuesday, Sept. 25).

Membership: Ron Hebert wasn't here, but his very good work at updating and reentering the membership data base into a format compatible with Excel was VERY much appreciated. The data is safer now, and available for many legitimate club uses including mail-merging (which will cut costs). This is huge (Mr. Martula has promised me his first-born child by way of thanks, but it's Ron who deserves whatever adulation will be delivered).

Youth Track: Sydney Henthorn spoke about this year's youth track program and expenses, summer and winter, and proposed changes of "the system" recommended by head coach Jim Clayton. Primary for him is getting a replacement coach to run the program, collect and crunch the data, and carry it all forward. Either a committed parent or a college/recent graduate should be hired; he proposed a salary of $2500. Sounded good to us, or at least no one complained. Scott Hunter agreed to check with Erik Nedeau (Amherst College) about prospects.

This was a successful year for numbers with 90+ doing the winter program and 375 or so the summer league. With a goal of increasing commitment from kids and families, the "grand prize" for participation is team competition at the Needham Invitational meets. Sydney suggested that the cost of bus rental for the Needham meet (now @$1100, about double what it was four years ago) may not be unjustified. Insurance concerns about coaching/practices/travel and competition were also discussed, but no decisions rendered.

Website: We're all waiting for this to happen. The Northampton Cycling Club's web guru (Mike Yargeau) will be taking over, designing a new site, and doing all that sort of stuff. Phew! Transfer is imminent (just like completion of several months' worth of BOD meeting minutes!).

Calendar: Being dependent on the website, this will also be taking off soon. In the hiatus, members are recommended to check out Coolrunning.com, WMAC, GSH, or EORC.

Membership Tables/At Race Promotion: Who'll run them? An on-going question. Dave Martula agreed to get the promo/gear bucket (one of them, anyhow; Donna apparently has the other) from Mark Mazzola, and will set it up at the Maynard race; Cathy Coutu and Chuck Adams will set up at the Spirit of Women. Trying to establish a regular volunteer's responsibility sounds nice, but seems unlikely. Ditto any devoted (deluded?) spouse/partner/friend. It's hard to run a table and a race simultaneously. All suggestions are welcome.

Sydney mentioned that SMAC was publicly appreciated as a sponsor at the Amherst Invitational Cross-Country meet last week (two weeks ago?). Yay us!

SMAC Grand Prix: A nice idea, much appreciated by President Utakis, but still in the concept stage - where it's been for some time now. It also means yet another set of data to collect, organize and crunch. No one leaped at the opportunity; Scott Hunter suggested tabling the idea and we did.

Race Team: Coach Barry, who we will assume to have been re-hydrating as he was absent this evening, has collected @$500 towards team expenses for the Nationals and has at least three candidates to travel: himself, Rodney Furr and Jeff Hansen. Maybe more; we'll see.

Recent Races: New: The Sherrif's Shuffle 5k in Greenfield (September 15) kicked off with a good turnout (100+ runners) and great competition. Venerable: The Summit Run in Hadley (September 16) celebrated its 25th. running with nearly 80 runners.

Upcoming Races: A whole slew of 'em! The Don Maynard 5 miler (Greenfield), Purple Valley Classic (Williamstown) and Walk, Run & Roll 5k & 1 miler (Brattleboro) are all on September 22. The last (#23 of 23) Stanley Park 3 mile cross-country race in in Westfield is on September 24, while the last (#26 of 26) Northampton 5k of the year runs on Tuesday, September 25, followed by the last (#26 of 26) Holyoke Elks 5k on Wednesday the 26th. September 29 sees the Spirit of Women 5k (Greenfield), and September 30 has both the Covered Bridge Classic 10k (Conway) and Topsfield's (if you like to drive) Cross-Country Festival. Saturday, October 6 has races in Pittsfield (5k and 1k trail), Hollis NH (Half-Marathon), Westfield (5k), and Fitchburg (7 mile trail and 5k walk), followed by Amherst's Larch Hill English Style Cross-Country festival on October 7, and a new set of races (5k, 10k and 1 mile) in Adams on October 8. October 13 has a 3.5 miler in Holyoke, the 7th. Annual Buttonball 5k race in Sunderland (9:00a.m.), and Hatfield's 1st. Harvest 5k (10:00a.m.). October 20 will see Belchertown's 12th. Project Stretch 10k, and October 21 the Westhampton Hills 5k.

The BOD will have met again by then.

Jones Race: All of last year's volunteers were asked to sign up for their same positions again. Also, we agree that the race should start at 11:00 instead of 1:00; this shouldn't present a hardship and may clear up some problems. All agreed.

Sawmill River Run: We were reminded that Al Ross is stepping down as race director and that no successor for this great event has yet come forward. It would be a shame to lose the race, so we hope someone appears. Soon!
br> After that, we left.

Respectfully (if thoroughly out of character by virtue of promptness) submitted,

Ben Bensen

Scribe

Return to the Meeting Minutes list page . . .