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December 2008
The Flying Irish Run Spokane!
Thursday, October 9th - the coldest day of the year so far. A few of the suburbs around Spokane have seen one of the widely scattered showers that moved through the area this afternoon. It's 5:30 and the sign-in sheets are laid out over three tables in the private dining room in the back of O'Doherty's Irish Grille. Shane O'Doherty is wondering out loud how many might show up for tonight's Flying Irish Running Club's weekly Thursday night run. He opts not to set up separate kegs in the back room figuring that a reduced crowd could be handled from the main bar.
Runners begin to show up, check their names off the sheets and engage in greetings and conversations; some are still finishing their wardrobe change from nine-to-fiver to three-miler. I count 17 sign-in sheets, single-spaced 53 lines per sheet. Tonight's runners are dressed a bit more warmly than in prior weeks and months, but they still come. Most stop at the two five gallon water dispensers set up near the front door for a final hydration before moving out to the wide sidewalk at the corner of Howard Street and Spokane Falls Boulevard.
A minute after the RiverfrontPark clock tower bongs six times, Peter jumps up on the concrete rim of a raised flower garden. The crowd of runners now clogs the sidewalk in front of the bar. "I've missed you guys!" Peter Shouts; he's missed a whole month of runs due to business travels. "Any virgins tonight"? referring to those here for the first time. A quick glance reveals a half dozen raised hands, but I know before I left the back room there were nineteen names on the waiver sheets for "First Time Flyers". "How many getting shirted tonight"? Again a half dozen hands are raised. Peter asks how many will be running the Spokane Full or Half Marathon this Sunday and about a dozen hands go up. "Any one doing the le Griz 50-mile ultra"? Only Deanna Ashby raises her hand and is warmly acknowledged by the more pedestrian runners around her.
Peter announces that the Nike running watch that has been promised to be given away "one of these weeks" will be raffled tonight. Tonight's route, he bellows, will be the Seven Bridges Run. With no further announcement he simply says "Let's Run!" The crowd moves to the cross walk and waits for the walk light, then moves en masse through RiverfrontPark toward the PostStreetBridge. In addition to the 19 on the First Time Flyers sheet, there were over 120 checks on the sign in sheets for a total of close to 150 runners on the street, two with leashed canines, two others with preadolescent children and at least one stroller.
Better than half of the runners wear the Club's pride-and-joy, long-sleeved, navy blue logo shirt. At least four others are sporting a slightly lighter blue shirt bragging of their mastery of last weekend's Portland Marathon. As the elongated file of runners passes the exit of a parking lot blocking it, Peter stops to thank a motorist for his patience in letting the runners pass.
Peter and Tim O'Doherty, the restaurant's principal owner, knew each other from weekly touch football games. Around St. Patrick's Day in 2006, Peter approached Tim with the idea of the running club, based on a similar one he had seen in Florida. Thursday night was selected because it was a relatively quiet (Tim might say dead) night at the Tavern making it the logical choice. That first year the biggest turnout approached 50 runners. In 2008 there hasn't been a night below 120. When a group of non-runners now enters the bar on a Thursday night they are challenged to find a seat anywhere, and if they come in after a hot summer evening's run they might find the back room of the place taking on the air of a locker room.
This night's course snakes through and around RiverfrontPark crossing seven bridges back and forth over the SpokaneRiver en route back to O'Doherty's. Garmin says tonight's run was 3.02 miles. All of the runs have names, some like tonight's are descriptive of the course, others like the Hooker Run and the Apple Run have a more associative meaning. All of the routes as well as other fun information can be found on the Club's web site,
www.flyingirish.org
. Some may find the Club similar in many respects to the Hash House Harriers, but it is far less structured and totally non-competitive.
Back at O'Doherty's lines quickly form at the water dispensers with most runners moving back outside to actually enjoy the brisk temperatures to cool down a bit before returning to the warmth of the tavern where seats quickly become scarce. Now Shane O'Doherty pays for underestimating the crowd, forced to schlepp pints of Full Sail Amber from the main bar. He does it happily, though, and with an expertise that sees almost every glass arrive filled to the brim. It's not all about the beer, but it's a lot about the beer (we're beer drinkers with a running problem!) - and the burgers. You see, after you have completed six runs you are entitled to the coveted shirt and when wearing this coveted shirt after a run you are further entitled to purchase the night's selected Full Sail product and burgers of choice at half price (Full Sail provides some level of sponsorship to the Club).
But not so fast - there is another hurdle to obtaining the magic shirt: in addition to completing six runs, the inductee must complete the ritualistic shirting ceremony which consists of standing on the bar and telling an Irish joke. There may be an Irish joke in circulation somewhere that hasn't been told at a shirting ceremony but if so it hasn't likely yet found its way to Google.
A few other Spokane area bars are now trying to copy the success of the FIRC on different nights, but there is still something unique about the original. Word of mouth is the driving force behind the club's growth, augmented by the now hundreds of logo shirts that show up at road races as well as along the roads and running trails around Spokane. The FIRC organization is somewhere between loose and nonexistent. They have no board, no corporation, no officers and no dues - only a loosely structured committee of Peter's appointees. And Kendra. If the heart and brains behind the Club belong to Peter, Kendra, a bartender/waitress at O'Doherty's, is its right arm. Somehow, this cobbled-together crew pulls off a weekly run that typically sees more runners than many organized annual 5 and 10K runs held around the region. We are told there are also F.I.R.C. members who run with us in spirit Thursday nights from postings in Baghdad and elsewhere.
After tonight's run, the season will see seven more, some in near total darkness before the Flying Irish go into hibernation for the winter, not to formally re-emerge until late February. That leaves just about enough time to earn one of those coveted, long sleeved, technical fabric shirts before winter. Over the cold winter months we members will look forward to Spring and maybe wonder just what it is that has catalyzed the success of the Flying Irish Running Club. Or not: we're more likely to simply be contented to know that it will be waiting for us in the spring. Slainte!
We wish that running clubs like the Flying Irish would lighten up sometimes! Post-run, left to right: Brendan Dowling, Tim Dunn, Jeremiah Alexander and Kendra Rechtshaffen.
Author & Flying Irish - Bob Cannon
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