The Beginning

This running team was started by a random comment during a summer easy run. It was mid-June 2010, and Eric Noel and I were discussing the benefits of a racing club mid-run. After finishing our collegiate eligibility at Nebraska Wesleyan University (NWU), we both wished that we could reap the benefits associated with a running team. We wanted to keep race prize money, wear a team jersey, get discounted shoes, but more importantly, we wanted to maintain a team atmosphere for training runs, similar to what we had at NWU. After all that talk, one of us (I can’t remember who) said, “We should start our own running club”, and we never looked back.

The first thing we did was look at getting membership in place. I talked to Quinn Lewandowski and Neil Wolford (both NWU Graduates), and likewise, they were also interested in the benefits that a local running team could provide. I then tackled the toughest issue standing between us and a running team: sponsorship. I sent out multiple “feelers” to several local, regional, and national companies, but I only had a couple promising leads. In the end, we worked out a partnership with the Lincoln Running Company in downtown Lincoln, NE, and we could not be happier (I hope that they feel the same way!).

That partnership led to the naming of our team: LRC Racing (Lincoln Running Company Racing). We had our debut race on July 24th, 2010 in Columbus at the Downtown Runaround where Eric Noel won the 2.1 mile in 10:31.3, and I won the 5 mile in 25:29.8. We also wore our new “Lincoln Running Co.” jerseys, and we even got our own little article in the Columbus Telegram the next day. Fun fact about the two races: I went out in 4:47 and Eric went out in 4:56. However, Eric did a much better job of pacing (he averaged 5:00, I averaged 5:06).

At this point, we are looking to add a few members to our running team, while solidifying membership requirements, procedures, and a few other little things (website, race directory, grill outs). Our goal is to provide the LRC Racing team a group of training partners, to increase the competition levels of road races in/around Lincoln, and to keep college graduates running after they exhaust their collegiate eligibility. So far, so good.

Logan Watley