The Running Club: Longwood’s newest fitness club
By: Vivian Gray
Nicholas Hylton and Dr. Virginia Beard after three months of hard work finally have this new club up and running on High Bridge Trail.
Nicholas Hylton, a sophomore criminology major here at Longwood University, has just recently founded a running club on Longwood’s campus. Running is not everyone’s cup of tea according to some of the runners. For those who enjoy running and want to push themselves to become faster, or want to become the healthiest that they can be, this club can help you achieve these goals.
To create a new club on Longwood’s campus can be a long-term drawn out process, especially if you don’t have the member and faculty support. The time it takes to create all the by laws and rules can be a very consuming process, which can slow down the development of the actual club. Another major rule required when creating a club on Longwood’s campus is the requirement to at least have eight members ready to participate before the club is even recognized, this was never a huge concern or problem for Hylton due to his connections in the criminology department.
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Hylton who is also in Longwood’s ROTC, Reserve Officers’ Training Course, must participate in lots of physical exercise to keep up with all his training he does for this program. So, he thought he might as well make doing this physical exercise fun by involving his friends and his favorite professors. Hylton said “I wanted to start a club and be a part of a club that I was passionate about and that was lacking on campus.” He began thinking about the idea of the Running Club at the beginning of the Fall semester of 2016, but due to some conflicts, mostly timing issues, the club wasn’t active until only a couple of months ago. It took the club exactly three months to get passed, which was longer than expected or wanted. That is why the running club wasn’t recognized or seen at the club and organization fair on Brock Commons at the beginning of the Fall 2016 semester.
Even though the semester is ending it not too late to join the Running Club. But, due to the club’s late acceptance there aren’t that many new members but with the new school year starting up in only a few months Hylton hopes to see new faces participating in his club. Due to his connections in the criminology department he knew a lot his friends wanted to join, even his advisor Dr. Virginia Beard was super interested in joining his club. To further advance your club in the ratification process you need an advisor which Beard gladly agreed to do due to her shared loved for running and who happens to also be Hylton’s academic advisor. Beard said “I love to run. It is a great stress reliever and it is also great for your physical condition.”
The Running Club meets every Monday afternoon at 4:30p.m. on High Bridge Trial. The runners start at the train car near Charley’s Water Front Café and will either go towards the bridge on High Bridge or towards Lancer Park on the trail, it just depends on what the runners are feeling that specific day. The club does a specific type of running, it is called a release run. Hylton said “everyone starts at the same place, you say go, and then you run for however long for so many minutes regardless of where you are. Theoretically everyone is finishing at the same time so the mileage comes down to the individual. It’s done like that to encourage everyone to come out.” He believes that this type of running is a fair and it can encourage more people to come out and participate.
To be a member of this club there is a fee of $5 to pay before you can participate. The fee is for when in the future, if this club becomes larger than it is now, and the members wants to hold some type of event that they would hopefully have the funds to put on the desired event. Beard said, “A goal eventually would be to run for a cause, sponsor a 5k, and the profit would be given to a nonprofit organization.” Hylton would also love to see his club that he put a lot of hard work into go as far as doing participating in something like that.
Katherine Joy, a sophomore criminology major here at Longwood University, has always participated in this club and sees herself continuing to participate in the upcoming semester. Joy also believes this club can achieve great things in its upcoming years. She wouldn’t mind the club expanded its horizons and running in different places besides High Bridge Trail, even though it is the most convenient in Farmville to go on a run. Joy said, “It would be really cool to do running on a trail through the woods with obstacles and hills.” If you are interested in being a part of this club you can go on to Longwood’s website and look up the running club and join their page to receive information and read about the goals of this club. Word count: 847
