About Crow Athletics
CLUB HISTORY
The exact origins of Crow Athletics are not that difficult to trace. On March 24, 1991 a group of Mount Desert Island area runners were heading to the now extinct Boston Primer, a 15 mile road race held annually in Readfield, ME. As they were traveling south down I-95 in a big Buick station wagon, the car full of runners suddenly thought that running as a team might be fun! The various names thrown out for selection (most of which are not fit to print) ranged from the utterly ridiculous, to generic and over-used terms such as 'roadrunners, striders, racing team, track club' and so forth. By the time the crew drove through Newport, (which is incidentally 26 miles from Bangor) someone pointed out the gnarly crows that line the highway eating dead things. After passing another group of blackbirds that wouldn't get out of the road, despite a ton of Detroit's best iron heading straight for them, the team name for racing at Readfield was born: "Road Crows." They won the team division and the name was used loosely over the next decade.
Fast-forward to winter 2001-2002, and another group of Mount Desert Island runners decided our island needed an organized running club. Again, many potential names were proposed and thrown out. (Most again, not fit to print.) Gary Allen, who was in attendance on the Readfield trip told the story of the original "Road Crows", and Crow Athletics as we know it today, was hatched!
Our club has since steadily grown into one of the most fun and forward thinking running clubs in the universe! We love to point out to anyone who asks, 'Why crow?', that we runners (like crows) won't get out of the road, we're afraid of nothing, we are found in every state and nearly every corner of the world, and we are impervious to the weather.
Our members are of all abilities and hail from all over the US, Canada, and beyond. Some are among the best runners on the roads, while others run purely for fun! Our namesake mascot has even appeared as a tattoo on several Lifetime Members! Crow Athletics is organized as both an RRCA and USATF club.
PS - Roadkill is a friendly little term we like to use in describing what we like to do to our race competition! CAW! CAW! CAW!
From the April 1992 issue of Mainely Running
#Crowathletics
Crow Athletics is proud to host the Down East Sunrise Trail Relay, the award-winning Mount Desert Island Marathon, and the FREE Millinocket Marathon & Half.