Since the summer of 1974, runners have traveled to Lyndonville to train in the refreshing atmosphere of the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont. Located just 30 miles south of Canada, our location offers warm days, cool nights and cold streams to soak in following afternoon runs. The dirt roads and running trails have changed little over the years. What has changed are our numbers of campers and the kind of running gear used by today’s runners.
|
The idea for the Green Mountain Running Camp came from an unlikely source -- two former competitive skiers. Peter Davis and John Holland graduated from New England College in Henniker, New Hampshire, where they were captains, respectively, of the Nordic and the Alpine teams. From their years of dry land drills, both were used to lots of running for pre-season conditioning. While Holland embarked on his teaching career as a middle school science teacher and coached the high school teams in Yorktown, NY, Davis went on to compete for the U.S. Ski Team in Europe and Scandinavia. After retiring from the U.S. Ski Team, Davis became a teacher and coach at Lyndon Institute in Lyndonville, VT, where he coached Lyndon Institute’s Ski Academy. The program recruited top high school talent from around the country because they could spend the full school year focused on Nordic training and competition. When not skiing, his athletes ran cross-country in the Fall and track in the Spring.
During the summer of 1973, Holland visited with Peter and his wife Nancy, helping to remodel their antique saltbox farmhouse. Mornings were spent running the trails and dirt roads in and around Lyndonville, and the idea for a camp came to them on one of these runs. The Lyndon Institute boarding facilities could house 50 runners, provide classrooms, a gymnasium and an auditorium. The two founders agreed on the “Green Mountain” name, trading on the state’s motto to advertise the camps ideal location.
Their next step was finding a successful college coach, who would also be a featured speaker, to join the two of them. Peter contacted Roy Benson, a former teacher and coach at the Institute. At the time, Benson was at the University of Florida pursuing a Masters in Sports Physiology, where he also coached the Gators’ distance runners and helped administer The Florida Track Club team that put Gold medalist Frank Shorter and two other teammates on the 1972 Olympic team. Benson had also been directing his own camp in North Carolina for two years, and brought this experience to Lyndonville to help Davis and Holland get Green Mountain Running Camp started. In addition, the camp needed an outstanding collegiate runner to feature as a guest speaker. Finding one wasn’t hard as recent Lyndon Institute grad Pete Squires was already making a big name for himself at Manhattan College in NYC.
|
With the staff in place, the camp was off and running…and still is 38 years later. Turns out that they had picked the perfect location: great training venues, good weather and a nice boarding school with excellent academic facilities. In the summer of 1974, Green Mountain Running Camp held it’s first camp session from July 21-28 with 4 staffers and 21 runners, including 8 from Holland’s team and 6 from Davis’ team. Fast forward to 2009…camp was three weeks long, with over 850 runners and 150 staffers...and is now held at Lyndon State College…just up the hill from Lyndon Institute.
Naturally, many things have changed over our 38 years. Peter Davis moved to the mid-west, two years after the camp started, to head up a national Nordic training center and Pete Squires left three years later to start his own camp. Four charter busses bring the runners to camp from the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area. And we no longer understand the lyrics of songs played at the Friday night “graduation” dance.
But, some things haven’t changed. Coaches Holland and Benson are still partners and run the camp. Workouts are still run on the same pine needle paths and scenic dirt roads. The soaking holes are just as cold and refreshing. The food is still specially prepared to meet the nutritional needs of athletes. And we continue to tweak the educational program every year to offer our runners the best knowledge in order to become smarter runners.
Nike has been our sponsor and a great supporter for over 20 years.
|
|
