Good for body and soul
A few years ago, the Saturday edition of the Times newspaper introduced a section
entitled Body and Soul. It was full of articles with advice about well
known topics like healthy eating and the benefits of exercising.
One of its most persuasive early features examined
voluntary activity. In essence, it
appears that volunteering can be a positive experience for the individual as
well as benefitting those who need the assistance. In modern parlance, this is a win-win
situation.
Just being a volunteer, on this analysis, is good for
your health.
Retrospective
Although I didn’t think of it as voluntary work at the
time, but when I was pursuing a professional career and raising a family I got
diverted - in a pleasant way - into what was then considered as extra-curricular
activity.
An invitation to join an
organisation called Omagh Junior Chamber introduced me to the world of
organising community events.
The Chamber took on all kinds of projects, like
organising Christmas Illuminations, Halloween Fireworks Displays, inter-schools
debating competitions, and sports events including swimming galas and a
mini-marathon.
I got involved in helping
and sometimes in organising these events.
In subsequent years after I left the Chamber, I
diversified, in a manner of speaking, and transferred that experience in
community project-management to cultural events.
I became the director of the Omagh Arts
Festival, a two-week extravaganza, featuring all of the major art forms. A risky venture in a small town in troubled
times.
The enthusiasm of amateurs and the joy of the novelty
factor brought us unexpected success.
Year
on year the festival grew in quality and in stature.
We did it for the experience, rising to a
challenge, and we worked for no financial reward.
Our motivation was community development and
making our town the best place it could aspire to be.
In the second half of my professional career, I was able
to witness volunteering from the official’s perspective.
In 1990, town planners became involved in
helping community groups to develop regeneration plans for their village or
town.
The process of guiding projects
from rough ideas via business plans and investment appraisal, never mind a
panoply of administrative procedures, through to bricks and mortar was often
difficult.
By contrast, the end results achieved by the energetic
commitment of local people working together always managed to exceed
expectations.
It was inspiring to be a
peripheral part of the civic efforts of determined volunteers creating jobs and
improving the appearance of these places.
Real job satisfaction.
Options
There are so many ways to get involved as a volunteer.
Some brave people work unpaid for charitable
organisations overseas, sometimes even in war zones or as support for emergency
services after a natural calamity.
When
I read reports of the medics who are volunteering in Syria, my history as a
volunteer becomes a much lesser achievement.
Other volunteers give their time to raise funds for good
causes at home. Domestically, people are
attracted to working unpaid for a vast range of charities, environmental
bodies, and community groups, or for cultural, educational, sporting, and
faith-based groups.
Sport
Having examined the success of the World Police and Fire
Games 2013[1] as an exercise in
volunteering, I want to look at sports volunteering a little further.
It allows me to make a metaphorical claim.
Running events is all about diligent project
management, marketing and implementation.
Two athletics fixtures will exemplify the contrasting
levels of responsibility that are available to willing volunteers.
Run Her October 2013
Since August 2007, athletics events have been held each
year in Northern Ireland under the banner of Run Her, one in spring the other
in autumn.
They comprise a 5k and a 10k
race, as well as a children’s run. Most
importantly, they are for ladies only.
Run Her is organised by a professional sports consultancy
with substantial backing with prestige sponsors. A slick operation.
A large field of entrants is guaranteed
because of the quantity and quality of publicity provided by the Belfast Telegraph
newspaper.
Moreover, competitors are
rewarded with a goody bag of practical items provided by an athletics retailer,
Pure Running.
The autumn race took place in the spectacular grounds of
Stormont Castle on 6 October 2013.
Approximately 1,200 women ran on what was a beautiful sunny and warm
day. Most of them were raising funds for
charities. Some even took the time to
dress up, ballet tutus being prominent on this occasion.
In these circumstances it is easy to be persuaded to be a
volunteer. Just submit your name, turn up
early on the day for briefing, and stand at a given spot holding your arm out
marshalling. More importantly, the
volunteer can help the multitude of long-suffering athletes by encouraging them
in the jargon to dig deep.
Unusually for athletics volunteers, Pure Running
generously provide the marshals with a selection of treats.
This year my bag included a good-quality
lycra tee-shirt, sports socks, a discount voucher for Pure Running, and a free
physiotherapy session, as well as cranberry juice drinks and sugar-free
chocolate.
Elaborate coverage of the races including 150 photos and
two videos was provided in the Belfast Telegraph[2].
I don’t know if she had the volunteer marshals
in mind (not all of whom were male), but our ubiquitous grand Dame Mary Peters,
the pentathlon gold medallist from the 1972 Munich Olympics kindly said:
“All the men round the course were
giving us great support and for them to give up their Sunday was great to see.”
Omagh Half Marathon
Saturday 21 March 1987.
High noon on the Old Mountfield Road just outside Omagh’s award-winning
Leisure Centre.
Two hundred athletes
line up to start the first half marathon with 5k fun-run ever held in my home
town.
Snow had been forecast but did not
materialise. Instead the inaugural run
took place on a cool bright day with light wind.
Perfect conditions provided an auspicious beginning for a
new event.
Like the majority of athletics fixtures, the Omagh half
marathon was established and organised by entirely volunteers.
In the first few years that role was
undertaken by Omagh Junior Chamber, appointing me as race director.
As a management training body with expertise
in organising projects which enhance the local community, this provided a
sizeable and enthusiastic band of voluntary help, particularly on the day with
registration and marshalling.
Omagh
Harriers Athletics Club subsequently took over management responsibility for
the event.
In founding the event, my main objective to provide a
road race which would be good preparation for spring classics such as the
London marathon. A late March date was
also well-placed between the end of the cross-country and the start of the
track seasons.
Part of the motivation was local patriotism in that it
would, if well organised, put Omagh on the athletics map.
Promotion
Marketing of any brand new event or product is crucially
important to establish it as a credible fixture. In the same way that the Run Her events have
been developed by professional people and become well-known, the Omagh Half
Marathon must also be promoted properly.
In the pre-internet era of the late 80’s, this was done
by as creatively as possible.
Posters
were organised for display in leisure centres, sports clubs and even on
lampposts; application forms had to be mailed to sports clubs and individuals
and also handed out at cross-country and other races; and articles were placed
in local newspapers.
We also relied on
the officials in Belfast’s Athletics House to add our event to their mailing
list scheduling official races.
Administration
Everything was administered to accord with the rules of
the sport.
Approval was sought from and a
permit granted by the Northern Ireland Amateur Athletic Association to stage
the race. The police were also involved.
Medical back-up was provided by the impressive
voluntary staff of St John’s Ambulance and the Order of Malta.
Scouts and Guides were recruited to assist
Chamber members at the water stops.
Other arrangements included seeking permission from the
Western Health and Social Services Board to include the grounds of the Tyrone
and Fermanagh Hospital as part of the route.
We nominated the Heart Chest and Stroke Association as the race charity,
encouraging runners to obtain sponsorship.
In early January 1987, the first completed entry forms
began to trickle in. Snail mail is the
modern pejorative.
I recall my delight
when the first form arrived in the post – it was from one of three Belfast
athletes with whom I had run the New York City Marathon a few months
previously.
It sounds like a modest
number in retrospect, but to have received nearly 100 entries before race-day
felt like a reward for hard graft, a minor miracle almost, and even more so
when entrant numbers doubled on the day.
All finishers received a special medal.
I had spent Christmas 1986 in Birmingham and
found a company which manufactures medals.
Because these looked quite different from local products, they suited
our objectives of being new.
Prizes were
presented to the first 3 men and first two women, and to the first male and
female veterans.
The field included quality athletes even in its inaugural
year. The female winner, Teresa Kidd and the second-placed male, Billy
Gallagher, represented Ireland the next month at the World Marathon Cup in
Seoul South Korea. Tony Hartigan from
Dundalk was the winning athlete.
We made improvements for the 1988 race.
We rented a state-of-the art electronic timing
system including a race clock for the lead vehicle and another for the gantry
on the finishing line at the running track.
The other piece of modern technology we used was to make video cassette
recordings of the race. The course
distance of 13.1 miles was certified by the Northern Ireland Road Runners Club.
I recall my biggest and recurring fear as race day
approached every year, and probably one shared by all race directors.
This was the possibility that runners might
go off-course.
To me this was a genuine
prospect, so complicated was the route with its many turns. This dread determined me to ensure that all
junctions must be well-and-truly manned.
I also had a large-scale map of the route printed on poly-board and
displayed at race reception, and another copy given to the navigator in the
race lead vehicle.
By dint of the negative prospect of nightmares, nobody ever
got lost.
In 1988 we persuaded Sub 4, the running apparel company
to become the race sponsor and they stayed with us for a couple of years. The prize list, consequently, became more
extensive along with the marketability of the race.
I directed the race for the final time in March 1990
after which I moved job and home to Belfast.
 |
| Video of Omagh1/2 marathon start 1989 |
Reflections
I competed in the Omagh half marathon on 12 occasions,
returning several times after moving home.
In my final year as director, I ran the course in 1 hour 24 minutes 51 seconds, and was the first Omagh runner over the
line.
When I ran it as race director, it
gave me a unique learning perspective over how our plans were being
implemented.
When I competed as a
visitor in later years, I was able to see how other directors were developing
the event.
Inflation in fees and running costs is one big
change. In 1987, 88 and 89 the cost of
entering before race day was £3.
The
other notable change from my years in charge is that today’s organisers avail
of the benefits of modern technology.
From a personal standpoint, it is pleasing to see things
that haven’t changed much, apart from a new principal sponsor(SPAR), the use of IT, and inflation in entrance
fees.
Key elements of the original
event remain - most of the route apart from the removal of some hills, the
start and finishing points, and the inclusion of a 5k event.
The twenty-fifth staging of the event will take place on
Saturday 29 March 2014, it not having been run in two years during the 1990’s.
Depending on discussions, I would like to mark the silver anniversary next spring by
presenting a perpetual trophy for the overall winner.
The growth of Omagh half marathon over the last quarter
of a century proves that voluntary effort can deliver successfully.
The indisputable indicator of successful
performance is the inexorable ten-fold rise in entrant numbers.
Thanks to my successors, this race has become
one of the most successful athletics events anywhere in Ireland, north or
south.
The hospitality provided may be
incidental, but no other big race makes its visiting athletes feel so welcome.
It was not in any way the reason why I got involved – my
perspective back then was not longer term.
The experience gained in learning how to run events as a volunteer early
in my career equipped me for more leisurely voluntary activity in retirement.
It also provides an indelible appreciation of the organisational work needed to stage events and especially of the unheralded efforts of everyday people to make community life better.
©Michael
McSorley 2013
