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Community Corner

History of the Rye YMCA Derby

In advance of the 22nd annual Rye YMCA Derby this Sunday, Rye resident and Patch reporter Michael Iachetta writes about how the event came to be.

It was getting towards the first weekend in May, the time for that traditional equine run for the roses that is the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, and they were brainstorming at the Rye YMCA about ways to raise money for scholarship funds.

Eamonn Coghlan, the Irish expatriate who would become one of the world's most renowned long distance runners, was one of the Rye YMCA Board members at the time. Piggybacking on that horseracing tradition, Coghlan came up with an idea that has become a decades long tradition—the Rye Derby.

Coghlan, 58, ran 83 sub-four minute miles, indoor and out. But he was the only Y Board member who was nicknamed "Chairman of the Boards" because he won 52 of his 70 races indoors at distances ranging from 1500 meters to the mile, including winning the world famous Wanamaker Mile at the Millrose Games a record seven times, his last win coming at the age of 34 in 1987.

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Coghlan was one of the great runners recruited from Ireland by legendary Villanova track coach "Jumbo Jim" Elliott, along with another middle distance great named Ron Delaney. Soon after Coghlan graduated from Villanova in 1976 with a Bachelor of Science degree in marketing and communications, he moved to Fairway Avenue in Rye where he continued his running as a different kind of "Chairman of the Boards," becoming, in effect, "Chairman of the Rye Boardwalk," with his training runs taking him across the Rye Boardwalk leading from Oakland Beach to Playland.

So when Coghlan told his fellow YMCA Board members way back when that he would use his name and contacts to lure world-class runners to the Rye Derby, they listened, according to Sally Wright, spokesperson for the Rye YMCA.

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Those elite runners came to Rye for what started out as an ultra-competitive five-mile race around the city. It has developed, 22 years later, into a one mile family fun run and walk that spills over into games, a jumping castle, barbeque, live music and entertainment afterwards at the Rye YMCA. There is a five-mile competitive race as well that still attracts several world class runners as well as competitive local runners.

This year's Rye Derby takes place May 2, starting at the YMCA at 10:15 a.m. for the elite runners, and at 12:15 p.m. for the family fun run. And, similar to the first ever event, it is still called the Rye Derby as presented by the Rye YMCA and Eamonn Coghlan.

Ms. Wright recently recalled what that first Rye Derby like, just like it was yesterday.

Wright said present at that first meeting, along  with Coghlan, were Board members Nancy Haneman, Terry Birdsong, Tom Fender and his son, Paul, with Paul still coming down from Massachusetts to Rye to help lay out the course and run the race, along with Auxiliary Rye YMCA Board member Susan Gervais, a local triathlon ace who helped organize the first Nature Conservance 5-mile fund-raising run recently.

Paul Fender, Ms. Gervais and a slew of Rye YMCA volunteers and staff will help the Derby get off and running this time around, with  participants ranging from Ethiopian, Kenyan and Polish runners now competing in Rye for various area track clubs, to moms and dads pushing kids in strollers in the family fun run. The elite runners compete for cash prizes awarded to the first three finishers: $600, $350 and $250 respectively in the male and female categories. The first Rye runners to finish in the various age groups also get medals, as do the first three runners to finish in nine different age categories, from 14-15 to 80-plus. Ribbons also go to all finishers in the one-mile healthy fun run and walk.

All proceeds from the Derby go into the YMCA scholarship fund that last year awarded over $250,000 in financial assistance so that young people and families could participate in YMCA character-building programs. Proceeds also contribute to teen programming and other important work in the community.

Coghlan, who still owns and rents his home on Fairlawn Avenue, has returned home to Ireland, according to Wright, where he works as a director of fundraising and development for Our Lady's Hospital in Dublin and is a regular panelist on Ireland's television station RTE for athletic programs. He and his wife, Yvonne, have four children, Wright said. Their youngest son, John, is one of Ireland's leading junior athletes and came to NYC several years ago with his father to run at Madison Square Garden in an elite race for outstanding high school long distance runners, Wright recalled. Their eldest son, Eamonn, is a professional golfer in the U.S.  Their middle son, Michael, is an aspiring actor who has appeared on TV3's Total Exposure. And their eldest child, Suzanne, has a career in banking, according to Wright, who has worked closely with Eamonn over the past decade as the YMCA Derby has evolved into one of the most popular races in Westchester.

As for the senior Coghlan, Eamonn usually leaves it up in the air until the last minute as to whether his work commitments will allow him to come back to Rye for the Derby he helped found originally, Wright said, He ran in the event last year, but it doesn't look as though he will make it back for this year's event, she opined.

But whether he shows up to this year's Derby or not, Coghlan will always be remembered in this city as one of the founders and prime movers behind the Rye Derby, just as track aficionados of a certain age will always remember he won the 5000 meters at the 1983 World Championships (and still remains Ireland's only ever male World Champion gold medalist), followed by two fourth place finishes in the Olympics (in the 1500 meters in 1976 and the 5000 meters in 1980), and a lot more, including becoming the first man over the age 40 to run a sub-four minute mile in 1994 on the Harvard University indoor track.

It was only yesterday that Coghlan was running in Rye, still looking like the Villanova runner who won four NCAA championships en route to becoming a three-time Olympian.

Okay, so it wasn't yesterday. But you can still see what his love for running brought to Rye when the latest Rye Derby kicks off on May 2.

For more information on the Rye Derby, visit www.ryeymca.org or call 967-6363.

 

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