The heart of runner...

Michael's running career began his sophomore year at Lock Haven State College in central Pennsylvania. Too small in college to play the sports he excelled at in high school, he joined the cross-country team in the fall of his sophomore year. Michael enjoyed a brief but successful college career, winning the mile run at the State College Conference meet his junior year and recording personal bests of 4:10 for the mile, 1:56 the half mile, and 52 seconds for 440 yards. .

Michael worked for a few years as a social worker in Pennsylvania before attending paralegal school in Waltham, MA. Recruited out of paralegal school by a Bangor.law firm, Michael arrived in Bangor, Maine in February 1980. It didn't take long before he was befriended by members of the local running community, including Bob Booker, Larry Allen, Mark Violette and Carol Roy Weeks. Michael helped establish the Downeast Striders Running Club and resumed his winning ways on the Maine road racing circuit in the fall of 1981.

Michael was a dominate force on the Maine road racing scene for almost a decade, setting course records and finishing in first place many times during his road racing career, include the following course record performances: .

06/20/81: Great Cranberry Island 5K: 14:55
08/15/81: Machias Blueberry Festival 5 miler: 25:10
09/07/81: Bangor Labor Day race (old 5.1 mile course): 25:05
06/19/82: Great Cranberry Island 5K: 14:51
08/14/82: Schoodic Point 15K: 46:51
08/21/82: Machias Blueberry Festival 5 miler: 24:45
09/19/82: Bar Harbor Half Marathon: 1 hr. 8m. 36 sec.

Michael won the Bar Harbor Half Marathon 5 times between 1980 and 1988 and established a course record in 1982. Michael made a couple not so notable trips to the New York City Marathon in the early 1980s but problems with high arches in his feet made it difficult to compete in the longer races. He also lived and competed in New Hampshire during 1986 and 1987 before returning to Maine to marry the lovely Beth Drake Putnam of Bucksport, Maine. A friend once brought it to his attention that he had seven finishes in the top three spots at the Kingfield 10K, but that it was one race that never yielded a victory. Michael had the honor of being on the cover of the Maine Running. Magazine three times in his career and one year was honored as the Maine Running Magazine's runner of the year. Michael was also an avid kayaker, cross-country skier and tennis player in his spare time.

One of his greatest thrills came very early in his running career when Michael, Coach James Dolan, and a couple other Lock Haven alumni, traveled from Pennsylvania to Charleston, West Virginia for the National Track and Field Hall of Fame 15 Miler. They arrived in Charleston at about 1:00 o'clock in the morning two days before the race, parked their van behind the Hall of Fame, and slept in sleeping bags on the lawn. In the morning Michael went looking for a rest room and ended up in the. kitchen at the Hall of Fame having donuts and coffee with three people who were discussing the clinics and other events taking place over the next couple days. Michael had no idea the company he was keeping until Coach Dolan came through the door and he discovered that his breakfast hosts were Jesse Owens, Wilma Rudolph and Jack Rose. Later in the day Michael and his team from Pennsylvania did a brief workout with Frank Shorter and Barry Brown, and the next morning before the race he warmed up with Jeff Galloway and Gayle Barron. Granted this was an exceptional event and a once in a life time meeting of celebrities, yet meeting one or two great runners is common place at many big running events.

It was late in his running career that Michael began officiating high school track meets around the State and then college track meets at UMO and USM, and he has become one of the most respected Starters and Clerks in the State. Michael says that getting to meet and encourage many of Maine's high school track stars is by far the most rewarding part of officiating. Michael says that running has been such a positive part of his life that he enjoys giving back to a sport that offers so much opportunity to young people of all athletic abilities. There are no other high school sports that field teams numbering well over 100 members and that offer such a variety of events for all body shapes and sizes and abilities.

Michael says that the most important reason he has devoted large amounts of his time to the sport of running over the years is because of what you learn about yourself on your way to becoming an accomplished distance runner. There are no compromises to be made during a race, no timeouts, and no place to hide from yourself. Winning distance races and setting course records is all about exploring physical and mental strengths, and learning to harness and release the flow of your energy. It is not always the strongest or the fastest runner that finishes first. Winners have the ability to focus better than others, and to train more consistently. Winners have hearts the size of locomotives that power their will to excel. In every single race there comes a time when the mind suggests to the body that it cannot sustain the pace or that its okay to settle for 2nd or 3rd or just finishing. It takes courage and discipline and heart to override negative thoughts during a race and to press on, to refocus on your strengths to accomplish the task of running your best.

Michael relaxed his training for a couple years as age 40 approached, and then resumed serious training in hopes of competing again on a national level as a Masters runner. Unfortunately, he strained his hamstring about two weeks before he turned 40 on August 16, 1992, and then reinjured it badly in the USATF National Masters 8K Cross-Country Championships in Boston, Massachusetts in November of 1992. He was able to hang on and finish fourth in the race and even managed another 4th place finish at the same meet the following November, but nagging hamstring problems have made it impossible to train with any consistency. Michael has not trained regularly or raced seriously since the fall of 1993, but his heart remains optimistic that you may still see his return to competitive form in the years to come.