Nolasco Pesina
Staff Writer
The gun went off on Saturday morning at Sneaky park and students, faculty and members of the community headed down D Street, for the 5k Community Fun Run, put on by the University’s athletic training education program.
“We want to raise community awareness of fitness and the athletic training student club,” Paul Alvarez, professor of movement and sports science, said.
The event had about 90 participants with their shoes tied tight and filled with positive energy.
“This year has had a very good turnout, one of the best we have had,” Alvarez said.
“The 5k run is a health and fitness thing, but we are also here to raise money for the program,” Alvarez said. “We don’t go to CAB and say we need $1,500 to send our students to a conference. We say we need $600 to raise $1,500 to send our students to the conference.”
The $15 pre-registration fee and $20 race day registration fee helps students to gain more knowledge about their profession by attending national and regional athletic training conferences.
“It is not a huge distance – 5k is basically 3.2 miles, which isn’t too far,” Alvarez said. “You can walk or run, which allows us to attract more people to our event.”
The run brought out students, kids and adults from all over.
“This is a great event to have on homecoming weekend,” Greg Dewey, provost and participant, said. “The run brings students, faculty, alumni and the community together and we are all here having fun.”
Seventeen minutes and 30 seconds later the first runner to cross finish line was Mike Riggs, a La Verne alumnus.
“I have been running this event since the early 90s,” Riggs said. “It’s a great thing to do, especially around homecoming, it gives us something to do in order to raise awareness about fitness and help out the program.”
A few minutes after Riggs crossed the finish line, the other runners began to come back.
“I saw a flyer about the run and I figured hey I haven’t ran in a while,” Samantha McComiskey, sophomore, said. “I feel like I went too fast in the beginning and towards the end it caught up because I ended up dying towards the end.”
“It is a non-competitive event and it is not meant to be. It is more like a community run with academics being the priority,” Dewey said.
Nolasco Pesina can be reached at nolasco.pesina@laverne.edu.
