Combat Cancer 10k (2010)

Blaine: I’m at the finish line of the Combat Cancer 10K at Pineland Farms in New Gloucester, Maine. This was a first year event supporting the Cancer Community Center, and it was a great race on some great trails. It’s a perfect day for cross-country. There was none of yesterday’s humidity, it was a little bit overcast, it’s probably in the mid 50’s; just perfect running weather.

We had a small turn out for the race, but it was a lot of fun. Pat Tarpy went out and apparently got a little bit turned around even though he marked the course, but he still managed to bring it home in about 34 and a half minutes which is just smoking on these trails.

Everything out here is basically just a big grassy road with a ton of hills. There’s a ton of elevation with very little flat areas that you can run on. And all in all I think there were about 75 people in the race. They’re still coming in at the moment.

I personally ran a high 37, 37:56 or so and finished 4th. The race is for a great cause. To that end I’d like to introduce Jennifer who can tell you a little bit more about it.

Jennifer: Alright!

Blaine: So tell us a little bit about the race and about the Cancer Community Center.

Jennifer: Yeah! Well the Cancer Community Center is a support and wellness center in South Portland. We support anyone who has been affected by cancer. So not just patients, but family and friends. And everything that we provide is free.

We have 16 hours average per week of programming, and we are open 6 days a week. And everything that we offer is free. So we depend on events like this which are the “Hit the Trails Walk” which we also had today and then our “Combat Cancer 10K” trail race is new. It’s the fifth year we’ve had this event over the years.

Blaine: Okay!

Jennifer: And we’ve had the 10K run as an unofficial fun run in the past. We’ve had merely a dozen or so people just go out and run the trails on their own. Most people walk. So this is our first year, we turned it into an official race.

Blaine: Excellent! And you had a bike ride yesterday.

Jennifer: We had a bike ride yesterday. This whole weekened is “Fight Back Weekend,” and so yesterday was the “Not Dead Yet” Bike Ride and Lobster Bake started by two radiologists who work at Mercy Hospital. And we had a 5 mile trail run for kids and familes, or ride. And then we had a 10 mile road ride, a 25 and a 60 miler, followed by a wonderful Lobster Bake all right here at Pineland.

Blaine: Excellent! I’m looking forward to taking advantage of the barbeque. There’s some great Atayne T-shirts for all of the runners, and there’s a moon bounce for the kids to play around in, and there’s a band playing in the background right now. So all in all it’s a lot of fun, and next year I highly recommend that you come out. And where can people go to find out more about the community center?

Jennifer: They can go to CancerCommunityCenter.org.

Blaine: Okay! Thank you very much for putting up the event!

Jennifer: Yeah! Thanks for coming out and running. That’s the important part. We could put it on, but if we didn’t have runners we’d get nowhere (laughs).