Member of the Month: Elaine Rice!

Unquestionably a compliment, it is difficult to forget Elaine Rice. A fun, compassionate and warm person, one will always remember the smile of this engaging and inspirational individual. Her friendliness and spontaneity have made her instantly popular in the running community, and her persistence and dedication to her running pursuits have helped to make her a better mother, wife, teacher and person. Through the experience of good times and adversity, she admits to growing and improving every day.

Although born in Brooklyn, Elaine has been a Long Islander most of her life, having spent her childhood and teenage years in Brentwood. In high school she exhibited her first inclination toward endurance sports, but not in the field of running. Instead, swimming, and particularly a race of twenty Olympic-sized pool lap lengths, was her strength. Swimming continued to play a role in her life throughout high school and college, as she became a summer lifeguard and eventually waterfront director for Camp Loyalton, a retreat for mentally handicapped children and adults located on the outskirts of Hunter Mountain.

Her six summers at Camp Loyalton helped Elaine discover a passion for teaching the mentally challenged. At SUNY Geneseo she coupled this desire with her schooling, and went on to obtain not only a Bachelor of Science degree in Special Education, but a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology simultaneously, admittedly a difficult but rewarding achievement.

Just prior to graduation, Elaine began a romance with a man so enthralled and persistent that he followed her back to Long Island. Engaged just months later, husband Ron has now been the most significant person in Elaine’s life for nearly a decade-and-a-half. They have two beautiful, playful little girls who round out a family that Elaine sincerely proclaims "makes all the difference".

As long as she has been married, Elaine has been teaching in Patchogue-Medford's Special Education Department. As if education wasn't prevalent enough in her life, Elaine acquired both a Master’s Degree in Education from Stony Brook University and New York State Certification in Reading from Dowling University in an inconceivably brief three-year period of evening classes, gathering 60 extra Educational credits along the way! Elaine admits she enjoys school and, incredible as it may seem, still continues her education. She is now in her fifth semester of French at Stony Brook, with a simple goal of one day being bilingual.

Elaine admits to thriving on challenges. One day her friend Mary Ann invited Elaine to run a road race with her. Having never trained before, Elaine completed a three-mile jog and "nearly died". Two other training runs were even worse, but they were enough to help Elaine complete her first race, the 1993 Long Island Half Marathon. Ignorant of the fact that there were shorter races, the agony initiated her chronic post-race mantra: "next time I’m gonna train for this race". Thankfully, upcoming pregnancies and motherhood duties kept Elaine blunder-free and on the sidelines for the next few years.

The following eighteen-month stretch proved to be the most difficult period of Elaine’s life. As her father battled and eventually succumbed to illness, Elaine began to run again to relieve stress and try to make sense of her world. Slowly the mileage increased as she witnessed the tragic passing of her grandmother, cousin, father, her dearest grandmother, colleague Cynthia Quinn, and a close friend. Out of sheer depression and the need for purpose, Elaine announced that she would run a marathon. Having seen a magazine advertisement on Team Leukemia’s charity efforts, Elaine decided to take their challenge, raise donation money, run the Hawaii Marathon in memory of her father, and make a difference.

As fate would have it, Elaine traveled to Washington D.C. to run the 1997 Marine Corps Marathon even before her trip to Hawaii. With a picture of her ex-Marine father accompanying her on her back, and through miserable conditions, Elaine’s spirit and determination helped her traverse the 26 miles. Through tears of joy and sorrow, Elaine and the memory of her dad crossed the finish line to a full Marine salute. Seven weeks later she completed the Hawaii Marathon, raised $5000 in donations, and kept the promise to her family and herself.

Running, and particularly marathoning, became a habit. Not one to shy away from travel, Elaine completed last autumn’s Chicago Marathon, and on measly three-mile training runs no less. After conquering the New York Marathon three weeks later, her all-too familiar lamentation reappeared: "next time I’m gonna train for this race". A glowing endorsement letter from a friend convinced the Boston Marathon committee to ease the qualifying time restriction for Elaine, and on she went to enjoy the prestigious spring classic. Just five weeks later, she could be found bopping through San Diego’s Rock ‘n Roll Marathon.

These days Elaine is actually training for autumn marathons and has completed several longer excursions, including the 22-mile trans-Fire Island run (on sand, no less), where she was the only BTC woman to finish. Her immediate goal is to hopefully PR in mid-October’s Steamtown Marathon, and follow up with the New York Marathon just three weeks later. These runs come on the heels of an excellent summer of racing at more mortal distances, as she attained several personal best times during the Monday night Summer Run Series.

Elaine has made many new running friends, and along with buddies Chip Herbst, Jim Hogue, Lynn Owen and partner-in-crime Jen Mendelsohn, Elaine and crew will take on the rolling hills of St. James twice a week. Add in races, speed workouts, more hill training and casual runs, and you’ve got a person who's really on the go. Sometimes she keeps on going, as the longer runs often turn out longer than anticipated. Her friends agree that Elaine is "directionally-challenged" and that she gets lost so easily that she often runs with an index card with printed directions. She also confesses to making many classic racing mistakes: partying late the night before a race, drinking coffee (a diuretic) before competing, wearing the wrong clothes, starting off too fast and racing to the point of sickness.

Elaine joined the Bohemia Track Club in the pouring rain at a race just over a year ago, and her meteoric rise has nearly guaranteed her a spot on the annual Most Improved Runner ballot. Elaine declares that she has never met a such group of wonderful, supportive people, and truly enjoys the comraderie and friendship within the running community. By the way, she was already familiar with several members of the group, including George Greene, a veteran of five of Elaine’s six marathons.

Although running obviously plays a significant role in Elaine’s life, it is far from the most important element. She feels her family is simply "phenomenal", and believes that there is nothing better than being mother to her two daughters. She greatly appreciates her family’s understanding of her passion for running, and singles out her husband Ron’s supportiveness. The two have made sacrifices in their complex lives in order to be with their children more often, and joke "tag, you’re it" as they pass the responsibilities of parenthood off to each other.

Elaine states that not only has running made her a stronger person, but has allowed her to be kinder to herself. She is proud of her achievements, and through her change she feels it has become easier to be kinder and respectful of others as well. She loves to laugh and smile, is a great conversationalist, and enjoys photography and scrapbooking her family history for posterity. She looks forward to being a positive role model and the best person she can be, and anticipates "enjoying the ride". True to her word, Member of the Month Elaine Rice is an inspiration in the marathon of life, smiling all the way.