Track and Field Blogs - Justin Kopunek

This past Memorial Day weekend, the string of major professional and DI collegiate meets took a break while the local 5ks took center stage. On Sunday the 24th, Trav's Trail Run went off at Muadslay State Park in Newburyport, Massachusetts for the 9th consecutive year. This isn't the most competitive trail race you'll find, or the most difficult, but every year it stands out in my mind. It is a 3 mile memorial for Newburyport native Travis Landreth. You may have never heard the name before, but those who have, remember it.

Every August before the cross country season officially starts, like many high school teams, mine would head off to running camp. Our destination was Lyndonville, Vermont for Nike's Green Mountain Running Camp. Every year we ran with and heard from countless collegiate and professional athletes, including Shalane Flanagan, Foot Locker finalists, accomplished coaches, like Villanova’s Marcus O’Sullivan, Nike representatives, nutritionists, and trainers. In 2001, before my sophomore year, and every year after, the speaker that stuck with me the most was Don Hennigar, coach of Newburyport's cross country team. With his thick New England accent, he spoke of his former athlete, Travis Landreth, who had become a mainstay at Green Mountain over the years. Landreth was an accomplished runner, who died on January 12th, 2001 in California while on a tempo run for the Nike Farm Team. He was only 24 years old at the time.

The story Coach Hennigar told begins well before that tragic day. In middle school, Landreth had an intense passion for skateboarding, but that gave way to running after discovering an aptitude for it in high school. He was a solid high school athlete, but not a top recruit by any means, with personal bests in the mid-4:20's and 9:30's. His unparalleled will to succeed and toughness are what set him apart. Landreth went on to represent the US at the junior level at the Pan Am Games in the 5,000m and at the World Junior Cross Country Championships. He also was an NCAA All American, Northeast Regional XC Champ and the 1997 Big East XC Champ. In fact, he was the first Big East Champ in UConn history.

Landreth could have easily been a good runner, but he was not destined to be great. The difference maker was that he went above and beyond what his natural-born talent gave him to become a stand-out runner on his way to greatness. The type that represented his country internationally and could stand atop a major DI conference as the best. This is what spoke to many of the runners in the room as Coach Hennigar shared with us his experiences with Travis. That anyone, regardless of their own mediocrity, could put their nose to the grindstone, the rubber to the pavement and achieve their own great accomplishments. For many of us it was not about garnering All American honors, but maybe it was being good enough to run in college, or winning your league meet. For my teammates and I it was about winning a state championship.

Each account from those who knew Travis personally, paints a picture of the same man. He had a tireless work ethic and drive to succeed, but he also loved running and brought an unrelenting enthusiasm and positivity that was infectious to those around him. It truly was a tragedy when his heart failed him while he was doing what he loved, running. A major loss for the running community. The final diagnosis was that he died of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a disease which causes the walls of the heart to thicken. Many will be familiar with Ryan Shay, who also died of HCM in 2007 at the Olympic Marathon Trials. Coincidentally, Shay too was a Big East Cross Country Champ, for Notre Dame in 1999, and was 11^th in the race the year Landreth took home the title. Both men sacrificed everything to the sport of running, but it was not for nothing. Landreth’s legacy is one of inspiration. While living, he seemed to inspire everyone he ran with from his younger sisters (who both became successful runners), to teammates, to campers and counselors at Green Mountain. He showed those who ran with him what it truly meant to work hard and to run tough.

After his passing, his character continues to inspire runners through those who knew him. Coach Hennigar is one who continues to tell Landreth’s story in hopes of motivating young runners to train with the same amount of grit, integrity, humility and passion. He also organizes Trav’s Trail Run each year in honor of his former athlete, a race that Landreth’s sisters have won more than their share of the women’s titles. Additionally, Asics named a shoe in honor of the late runner. For those of you who are neutral runners who like Asics, like me, you may own a pair of GEL Landreths. Throughout my running career, many people I met along the way, ran with, and ran against motivated me, but Travis Landreth did so without me having known him personally. Runners like Steve Prefonataine, Jim Ryun, and Billy Mills do this same thing for thousands of young runners each year and Landreth would do it for me and hundreds of my fellow campers each summer. I found myself as a senior in college, working at a running store telling anyone who looked at the GEL Landreth everything I could remember about him. That’s when I knew this story had stuck with me all those years; the words of those who knew him still echoed in my head. I had been taking pieces from what I learned about him with me on every run and in every workout since I was 15 and that speaks volumes about the impact one runner can make.