An All-Star Cast
November 3, 2022
Fulfilling a Lifelong Dream
November 9, 2022
Hello Knoxville Track Club members… and friends! We are excited to make the stories and articles from Footnotes, our award winning newsletter, available to everyone - not just members. For 30 years, we’ve shared news, training tips, race recaps, and numerous other features with the membership. We’ve decided we should really share these articles with the entire running community. For my first message, I’m going to tweak and rerun the note I wrote at the beginning of 2022…
Run the Club!
The Knoxville Track Club continues be put on races, support local athletes, volunteer, and do all the other things that support our mission to encourage life-long physical well-being through running and walking as we try to realize our vision of “Healthy living, healthy community – one step at a time.”
Towards those ends, I will be challenging the staff, the board of directors, our members and friends, to help us achieve those goals. One way to think about an organization is by dividing its activities into three areas: Run the Business, Grow the Business, and Transform the Business. For us, we’ll tweak those labels, but the principles apply.
Run the Club
Running the Club is about the core activities and all the things that come to mind when you think of the KTC. We’ll put on road and trail races - including our premier event the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon. RunKNOX training will help runners achieve their goals throughout the year. We’ll support local athletes like those running team relays or representing the Tennessee Running Club. We’ll provide operational and timing services to non-KTC races. We’ll do all the behind the scenes work to maintain our status as a non-profit organization. Running the Club is all about executing well.
Grow the Club
Growing the Club is just that - adding members to the roll, increasing the number of participants at races, growing the RunKNOX training group, signing-up more volunteers to support the other activities, etc. These are the incremental changes that will allow the Knoxville Track Club to have a greater impact in the community.
And here is the first call to action…
- If you aren’t a member, please join the club. The membership will pay for itself through race and other local discounts!
- If you are a member, think about including your entire family when you renew your membership.
- Invite a friend to join you at a race.
- Want to run more or faster? Sign-up for a RunKNOX training cycle and get coaching expertise, group accountability, and a great support community.
- If your organization doesn’t participate in the Covenant Health Knoxville Marathon’s Fittest Company or School Challenges, reach out and let’s get connected.
- Spread the word about KTC activities - like, share, retweet on social media.
- Did you have a great experience at another race or receive cool swag? Let us know what things get you excited about participating.
- Are you a student or someone who needs volunteer hours? Sign-up to be a course monitor or to work a water stop.
Transform the Club
Transforming the Club is the most exciting area, but also potentially the most difficult. These are the activities where the Knoxville Track Club tries something new. For us, we are still trying to figure out what this might be. Is it developing a deep partnership with another organization that has similar goals? Is it a capital project like building a community track? Or working with the University of Tennessee to support the Track and Field team? What can we do to fulfill our mission of encouraging life-long physical well-being through running and walking? How do we enable our vision of “Healthy living, healthy community – one step at a time?” How do we give back to the community?
The second call to action…
- Let us know your thoughts on a big goal for the Knoxville Track Club.
- Think your organization would be a good fit as a partner? Reach out!
With an amazing 60 year history, the Knoxville Track Club has a tremendous foundation to build upon. I’m excited to see how it grows and transforms in the future!
