Torch Run blazes path to State Games
TONY BROWN/DAILY FORUM
Participants in the Maryville leg of the Missouri Law Enforcement Torch Run for Special Olympics are shown jogging south down Main Street toward the Kawasaki Motors manufacturing plant on Tuesday. Samantha Catlett, center, carried the torch during the opening blocks of this year’s event.
About 40 law enforcement officers, Special Olympics athletes, and community members participated Tuesday morning in the local leg of the 30th annual Missouri Law Enforcement Torch Run.
The run raises awareness for Special Olympics, the world’s largest sports organization for children and adults with intellectual disabilities.
During 2016, the Special Olympics movement, which was founded in the 1960s by Eunice Kennedy Shriver, will offer year-round training and competitive events to more than 4.5 million athletes in 170 countries.
In addition to this week’s traditional run from the Nodaway County Courthouse south on Main Street to the Kawasaki Motors manufacturing plant, the local event, for the first time, includes a walking leg extending west on Fourth Street, north across the Northwest Missouri State University Campus, east on Seventh Street, then south on Main back to the square.
Local Torch Run coordinator James Runde of the Maryville Treatment Center said the walk was added in order to give more people a chance to participate.
Melody Prawitz, state Special Olympics development director for the 27-county North Area, said the Torch Run was established in 1986 by the Missouri Police Chiefs Association and functions as an introductory event leading up to the State Summer Games, which begin Friday in Springfield.
What started in the mid-’80s as a 30-mile relay is now a four-day trek during which approximately 1,000 runners cover more than 950 miles. The run originates in more than 40 locations and culminates at the site of the State Summer Games.
Two thousand athletes and coaches are expected to attend this year’s Summer Games, which last through Sunday with competitions in swimming, track and field, and weightlifting.
Prawitz said the run gives the organization a chance to recognize Missouri law enforcement and corrections officers who organize fundraising events throughout the year under the Torch Run banner.
The wide variety of activities includes golf tournaments, polar plunges, motorcycle poker runs, rappelling challenges, the “World’s Largest Truck Convoy,” wear-jeans-to-work days, and “Tip-A-Cop,” during which officers wait tables at restaurants and donate their tips to Special Olympics.
Combined law enforcement efforts statewide raise about $2 million a year, with North Area events accounting for approximately $150,000 of that total.
Prawitz said there are currently 15,000 Special Olympics athletes in Missouri, 1,100 of whom live in the North District, which extends from the Missouri River to the Mississippi and includes the counties of Adair, Andrew, Atchison, Buchanan, Caldwell, Carroll, Clark, Clinton, Daviess, DeKalb, Gentry, Grundy, Harrison, Holt, Knox, Lewis, Linn, Livingston, Mercer, Nodaway, Putnam, Ray, Schuyler, Scotland, Shelby, Sullivan, and Worth.
She said between 55 and 60 athletes participate in Special Olympics in the Maryville area, where programs exist for both adults and students in the Maryville R-II School District.
In addition, the local Young Athletes Program provides training and exercise opportunities for children younger than 8 years, the minimum age for participation in Special Olympics competition.
While there is no shortage of athletes in Nodaway County, Prawitz said, there is an urgent need for coaches and other volunteers.
“We’re a volunteer organization,” she said, noting that the organization employs only 30 management and fundraising professionals statewide and spends 85 cents of every dollar donated on programs that directly benefit the athletes.
“We’re very proud of that,” Prawitz said.
Once the State Summer Games are over, Special Olympics will switch over to a new lineup of sports that includes softball, flag football, and golf in preparation for a new round of local, area, regional, and state competitions this summer and fall.
Fall and winter activities, she said, include bowling, basketball, figure skating, speed skating, and floor hockey.
Anyone interested in serving as a Special Olympics coach, or in some other volunteer capacity, can call the North Area office at 816.233.6232, email Prawitz at [email protected], or email Program Director Alyssa Humphreys at [email protected].
