April 7, 2007
By Mike Foley - The Greenville News
This morning, a new day dawns for the Furman University track and field and cross country programs.
A once-great program that was nationally ranked in the 1970s, and has now been long overshadowed by other Furman sports, got a huge boost Friday night when plans were announced for a $2.5 million track house and a new track complex.
The first phase of the project is a two-story, 6,000-square-foot track house. It will include track and cross country locker rooms for the men and women's teams, coaches' offices, a reception area, a warm-up area for the athletes and more.
Attached to the track house will be a new 2,000-square-foot laboratory for the Furman Institute of Running and Scientific Training faculty.
The track house will be situated atop the hill overlooking the track, off Cherrydale Lane.
The announcement of the new track house also includes subsequent plans to renovate the track, install lighting, construct bleacher seating for 1,500, erect a press box and add parking. Those additions will follow in phases, said athletic director Gary Clark.
Bill Pierce, head of Furman's Health and Exercise Science department and an integral part of the FIRST team, was exuberant at the new possibilities as he revealed the plans to the crowd.
"I don't hesitate to say," he said, "this will make Greenville the running center of the East."
The facility improvements came on the same night as the Blue Shoes banquet held at the Hyatt Regency downtown. There, 400 Furman alumni, current Furman athletes, runners from across the Southeast and members of the Greenville community gathered to celebrate the opportunity this afternoon to see the chance for the first sub-4 minute mile run on a South Carolina track.
Attendees heard from 1972 U.S. Olympic gold medalist at 800 meters, Dave Wottle, as well as former Boston Marathon winner Amby Burfoot. In the crowd were 12 of the 13 elite milers set to battle today at 2 p.m. in the Asics Blue Shoes Mile.
But as the dinner wound down late Friday, Paladin Club president Ken Pettus made the announcement of the new track facilities.
If the teams hadn't already been boosted by nearly $2 million raised for athletic scholarships -- largely courtesy of Chris Borch, a former Paladin runner -- the new facilities could help vault the teams back into the national limelight.
"Hopefully, this will help us," said Gene Mullin, the Paladins' head cross country and track and field coach. "It will help us do things we couldn't do before."
Pettus said that with new scholarships being added for track and cross country, excellent coaches, the money to travel to national-caliber meets, and now the finest facilities, the two sports can excel.
"There's no reason we shouldn't compete with the best in the U.S. now," he said.
While running at Furman, Borch, a 1978 graduate said, he learned valuable lessons. Now, he said he's happy to give back to Furman.
"With track," he said, "I learned passion. Track is one of the last pure sports. It brings out in us the things we admire in others."
