Weather didn’t deter Shamrock Run 5K participants
CRANBERRY TWP—Liam Shilk of Clarion didn’t seem too excited to be running in Saturday’s Shamrock Run 5K at Graham Park. His eyes were half-closed and he was flat on his back.
Of course, Liam was only six months old and mostly uninterested as his mother, Heidi Shilk, was bundling him up before the race. She would be pushing Liam and his two-year-old sister Maura in a double stroller during the race.
“We’re going to give it a go, and she’ll still win,” said Liam’s father Kyle Shilk as they prepared before the start of the run at the park’s back shelter under a gray sky, sprinkles of rain and temperatures in the mid-30s.
“We try to get together every two to three weeks to run a 5K. We’re going to meet up with my brother and his wife. They came up from Uniontown,” he said.
“This is my first time pushing a double stroller,” said Heidi Shilk. “You just keep moving. You do not stop or getting restarted will be really hard. The hills are rough.”
“Go fast!” said Maura waving a yogurt tube.
The Shilks were among the runners who were registering and collecting T-shirts and hats before the 9 a.m. start of the event put on by GCXC Race Timing & Management. In keeping with the shamrock theme, people came dressed in green sweatshirts, leggings, socks and hats.
Robin Gulley of Scottsdale and her friend Barb Palmer of Greensburg were longtime 5K participants.
“I’m in my 163rd 5K, that’s what brings us. I’ll drag her all over the place,” said Gulley about her friend. “I do it for my health. I weighed a 100 pounds heavier when I first started. Now, it’s mental therapy.”
Palmer said she started entering 5Ks six years ago six months after her back surgery as a form of therapy.
“I ran into her and that was the end of sitting at home on Saturdays,” she said of Gulley.
Gulley and Palmer said Saturday they were walking the course.
Gulley said, “Normally, we’d run, but we’re walking for pleasure today. We just want to finish.”
GCXC stages 80 runs a year in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia.
“We’ve got 275 participants, not bad for this crappy weather,” said Matt Imhof, the race director. “People travel for this.”
Army veteran Miguel Encinas, carrying a rucksack and American flag, traveled from Bridgeport, Ohio, for the Shamrock Run 5K.
“See my flag? I do it every weekend. I run for the fallen. I honor the servicemen and women who passed away,” said Encinas. “My flag has the names of the last 13 servicemen who got killed in Afghanistan during the bombing in Kabul.”
Not everybody at the event’s staging area were runners. Josie Daltorio, Fatima Bokhari and Margot Anderson were members of the North Allegheny High School Key Club who volunteered to man the registration table passing out T-shirts, hats and number plates to the participants.
“We’re all part of Key Club and are doing this for volunteer hours. I did not know it was going to be this cold,” said Josie.
Imhof said awards would be given to the top 3 men and women overall, and the top finishers in age groups ranging from 10 and under to 70 and over.
Evan Conti of Wexford was the first across the finish line with an unofficial time of 17:34 minutes.
“It was cold. It was a nice course. There were some good guys out there. I tried to keep pushing, ” said Conti, who ran in high school and college. “I’m training for the half marathon.”
The top woman finisher was Casey Columbus of Latrobe with an unofficial time of 20: 52 minutes.
“I’ve never run it before. It was my first time here,” she said. “It felt really good despite the weather. It’s a great course.
“I used to do ultra-marathon running, but now I’m doing this, fast and short,” said Columbus.
Heidi Shilk crossed the finish line with both her children asleep in their double stroller.
She said her daughter nodded off midway through the course.
“She’s a trooper. She’s done quite a few races now,” she said.
