Saturday morning ‘all-comers’ run popular in downtown Cd’A

If you need a reason to get out of bed early on a Saturday morning, Fleet Feet has your answer, with the popular “all-comers” run. Varying in distance and direction, the run kicks off with a meeting inside the store where Garth Merrill, owner of Fleet Feet Coeur d’Alene, will usually break down the route and pass on any other information the runner might need.

“We’ve done the Saturday runs from the store since we opened — so almost 12 years,” Merrill said last Saturday, just prior to the weekly run. “We call it an ‘all-comers’ run because anybody and everybody is welcome to join, regardless of whether or not they are enrolled in one of our training groups.”

Merrill said the store has staff on hand to “hold down the fort and watch over keys, purses, backpacks or whatever folks leave behind while they’re out on a run.”

The store always has coolers with water and electrolyte drinks ready for before and after the run, and folks will often make use of the demo massage products like foam rollers and massage sticks for pre-run warm-up or post-run recovery.

Merrill tries to mix up routes to keep the run interesting, and is looking to implement some trail running in the near future.

“Typically I’ll pick a direction for the morning run, usually one way or the other on Centennial Trail,” Merrill said. “We have a white board where we’ll list turnaround points for various distances, so for example if you want to run 4 miles you’ll know to turn around at the condos at Potlatch Hill Road, or if you’re going 8 miles you know to turn back at Tony’s.

“Sometimes we’ll do a special run like the French Gulch Loop that requires a bit more planning and direction.”

On any given Saturday, Merrill said there may be folks training for Ironman or ultra marathons or marathons or half-marathons, who may run 8 to 20 miles, while there are also people training for 5Ks or 10Ks or those who are training for nothing at all who will run shorter.

“Usually we all head out together, and let pace and distance sort us out over the first mile or two,” he said. “It’s a fun time, that first half-mile to a mile when the group is still pretty much together and everybody is sort of feeling their way through the first steps trying to figure out what kind of morning it will be on the run.”

Merrill said sometimes they’ll have fast runners at the front of the group, but the average pace is between 8:30 — 14 minutes per mile.

“The Saturday Run is at its biggest when we have our 5K/10K and marathon/half marathon training groups going, because we schedule those runners to do their long runs from the store on those days. Those are groups people pay to join for coaching and camaraderie, pointing toward specific goals, but it’s not necessary to be a member of a training group or make any purchase at Fleet Feet to join the Saturday Run. We’ve had as few as two runners and as many as 40 for the Saturday runs.”

The “all-comers” run takes place rain, snow or shine. Merrill said they have modified the run a few times for extreme cold and poor air quality — usually by setting up a course around the block or close to the store downtown so runners could limit exposure if needed.

“Weekly runs are often a staple of specialty running stores like ours,” he said. “As a result, we often get phone calls from out-of-towners here on vacation or work who know to call the local running shop if they’re looking for a group run. I like to think it’s a pretty nice look at the people and places of our community for the outsiders.

Other free run opportunities from Fleet Feet include free Tuesday night track workouts at Coeur d’Alene High School, which will continue through September. Starting mid-August the shop teams with Dave Dutro and Trail Maniacs to offer a free four-week trail running class. “We’re looking to help build our trail-running culture here in North Idaho,” Merrill said. “Right now I’m trying to find a way to have another coach lead the Saturday runs this summer/fall so I can do some Fondo training rides on at least some of those mornings — but it’s hard to imagine not being there to give the group my usual urging, “Let’s go be runners!” and heading out the door with a fun bunch of runners.