Benefield: Beloved, and brutal, Kenwood Footrace set to return July 4

Your legs and lungs may not be clamoring for its return, but your soul just might be.

After a two-year COVID-induced hiatus, the much-loved, much-feared Kenwood Footrace is back on the books for the Fourth of July.

The race (which actually offers two races: a 3K and a 10K) has been an Independence Day staple for so long — the first run was in 1972 — it’s believed to be the oldest 10K in California.

“It’s big,” said Catherine DuBay, this year’s race director and president of the Empire Runners club, the group that assumed ownership of the race in 1994.

It’s big because it draws a lot of people year after year — as many as 1,000 runners in 2018. It’s big because it’s a difficult course. It’s big because it’s a piece of a longer list of Independence Day events including Kenwood’s parade.

And it’s big because it’s wormed its way into people’s hearts and muscles and become a piece of how so many celebrate the Fourth of July.

“It has so much history,” DuBay said. “People were really anxious to get it back. My gut tells me it’s because so many people have this as part of their tradition.”

And apparently, a little early morning pain, some lactic acid burn … it’s all part of the fun.

“It’s really challenging,” she said of the famously hilly terrain.

But the course offers up some eye candy to distract runners from their suffering.

“You get to run through private property you would never get to run through, you are in vineyards, you’ve got a steep uphill and screeching fast downhill,” she said. “It’s a beautiful, beautiful course.”

But it asks something of runners.

“Definitely it has the hills that make it more challenging. That’s the draw of it,” said Kenny Brown, who in addition to being race director once or twice in years past, has run to 10 top 10 finishes, according to club records.

“I think that’s a lot of it. Runners don’t necessarily tend to take the easy way out. That’s what makes it exciting, that is honestly what makes it memorable, too,” he said. “You do it a few times and it becomes that tradition.”

The event is so ingrained in the community that even some runners who no longer lace up their shoes or pin on a number have the Kenwood Footrace penciled into their Fourth of July activities.

Scott Chilcott, who ran the second running of the race back in 1973 (and still has the T-shirt to prove it) and ran something like 20 in a row, will be there on the Fourth. He’s not running it, he’s 91 and hung up his running shoes a while back, but he’ll be there.

“It’s been such great fun for us for so long, I can’t imagine us not going. It’s just one of those things,” he said.

When Chilcott was back in his marathon days, the Kenwood Footrace was both brutal and beautiful — and all the runners he knew would show up.

“I knew so many of the runners and it was just the thing you had to do and I enjoyed it immensely,” he said. “It’s such a wonderful route too. Beautiful, through the vineyards and along the creek. You can make it as hard as you want just by going faster.”

And many people do. Over the years, the Kenwood Footrace has drawn some of the area greats.

Using a lens of high school standouts, the list of athletes who have run this race is borderline ridiculous.

Among the women who have raced either the 3K or 10K: Two-time Olympian and Montgomery grad Kim Conley; Olympic trials qualifier and El Molino grad Nicole Lane; Santa Rosa High’s state champ multiple times over Julia Stamps Mallon; Healdsburg grad and state cross country champ Sarah Sumpter; Montgomery grad and multiple state champion Sara Bei Hall, and Santa Rosa grad and state cross country champ Trina Cox.

On the men’s side, Petaluma High’s Danny Aldridge, who broke the four-minute mile four times in his career before going into coaching, has raced here multiple times; Santa Rosa High’s Reesey Byers and Piner High’s Luis Luna have both finished in the top 10 six times each.

The list literally goes on … and on … but you get the idea.

But don’t get the notion that this event is only for the elite. It’s definitely an all-comers-are welcome thing, DuBay said.

“People tell me all the time, ‘Oh my god, it was my first 10K and my sister dragged me out,’ or ‘It was so hard but so fun,’” she said.

DuBay ran her first Kenwood when her sixth grade softball coach made her team turn up.

Something about it (or perhaps all of it), the day, the atmosphere, the course, has kept her coming back. She sits atop about every all-time list host club, Empire Runners, keeps. She’s had the most 10K wins with 8 and the most top 10 finishes by a mile with 23.

Maybe the pull is the good the race does.

It’s the Empire Runners only true fundraiser of the year and when the Kenwood Footrace started becoming profitable, DuBay said club leadership decided to start awarding scholarships to high school athletes who want to pursue running in college.

The number of athletes who receive scholarships varies year to year, but awards range from about $1,000-$2,000.

“We want to encourage them to keep running,” she said.

And the Kenwood race itself is meant to encourage folks of all speeds and abilities to keep running.

Whatever it is, the Empire Runners are hoping 600-700 hardy souls, many of whom have waited anxiously for its return, will toe the line on Independence Day.

And for many in that crowd, it’s the only “race” they will do all year, Brown said. Because, well, it’s worth it.

“I sometimes hear people say, ‘Oh I only do Kenwood.’”

You can reach Staff Columnist Kerry Benefield at 707-526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @benefield.