Warmer weather allows runners to find more jogging routes


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Orrin Shawl | Staff Reporter Members of Club Running begin their daily jog at the Student Activity Center on April 7, 2014.

With all the snow melted and the sun emerges, many Central Michigan University students are taking to the pavement outside for the first time in months.

The registered student organization known as Club Running at CMU, has been running on an indoor track at the Student Activity Center for most of the semester, but have recently taken its workout outdoors.

Rochester sophomore Anthony Kowalchick said the group calls its main route, “Campus Loop.”

The group starts by running down Broomfield Road to East Campus Drive and then down Broadway Street. Then they head to Washington, and take it back to campus.

“We cut a bunch of lawns to get back to the sidewalk in front of the library and run back (to the SAC)," Kowalchick said. "That’s about four miles.”

The Campus Loop isn’t the only route used by Club Running.

President Andrew Haubenstricker, a Frankenmuth senior, said the club experiments with different routes, throughout campus and off-campus dirt roads.

“We function like a high school team does," Haubenstricker said. "Our season is like cross-country, and our winter is like indoor track. In the winter, not nearly as many members will run outside; only our dedicated members will do that.”

When the club meets in the SAC lobby for its practices every weekday at 5:15 p.m., the experienced runners of the club share a map with the group of the route they plan to run that day.

“This year, we only had 10 returners, and even they weren’t showing up that much," Haubenstricker said. "It’s more the job of the trainers like myself to lay out the routes. If you’re a runner, you get to learn and find routes through us.”

Club Running isn’t the only CMU organization that runs throughout CMU's campus.

Joseph Kok, an instructor in the ROTC program, said a cadet and his group run a route through campus or throughout Mount Pleasant at least twice a week at 6 a.m. Kok said ROTC cadets run anywhere from two to four miles per run.

“We don’t have any specific routes," he said. “We’re non-exclusive. (The route is) wherever there’s a route that seems interesting.”

A Mount Pleasant business also embraces the opportunity to find creative routes.

Runners Performance Manager Josh Berghuis said whenever he and his friends decide to go on a run or hold an event that goes through campus, it is convenient for them because of the plowed sidewalks. But Berghuis prefers running where there’s peace and quiet.

“We’ll run or bike a route beforehand just to get an idea of the surrounding, to see if it’s wet, muddy or dry," he said. "The main thing is that it’s out in the country and it’s really quiet. Some people, like us, just enjoy running for that quiet time.”

One of Berghuis' routes starts at his store,  jogging north on South Mission Street from his store, to take a left on East Broomfield Street and turn left on West Campus Drive. He then turns right onto East Campus Drive until hitting East Broomfield Street and running back to the store along South Mission Street.

Berghuis said the route is 2.62 miles to commemorate the Boston Bombing incident last year.

“The starting and finish point is always at the store,” he said.

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