East cross country coach Tricia Beaham sat by the track waiting after school on Feb. 14. Kids slowly flowed down from the school, carrying their running shoes in a bright green Nike track bag, fist bumping their cross country friends they haven’t seen this season or murmuring about what this “Spread the Love” run might be.
When each runner reached the track, Beaham greeted them with a smile, a pink Valentine’s Hyvee cookie and a free white T-shirt, printed on it a winged shoe and a heart titled “Spread the Love, 2/14.” She couldn’t stop smiling. After all, she finally felt she was able to help her athletes give back to the community.
Beaham was running the first annual “Spread the Love” run, where cross country runners and members of the East community met Beaham on the track after school to run 2.14 miles on Valentine’s Day. The goal of the run was to “spread love” to families in need by donating money raised — there was a $20 suggested donation per runner — to them.
“Having it on Valentine’s Day made a good excuse for me,” Beaham said. “An excuse to say that I love my cross country kids, I love my track kids, I love the people I coach with and I love this community.”
The donations from the Spread the Love race totaled $1,200. 75% of the proceeds went towards families within the East community that Beaham knew were in need, and the other 25% would be donated to a family in Oregon — the same family that East alum and cross country coach in Oregon Carl Sniffen ran 30 miles, a mile for each year he’s coached.
Beaham’s inspiration for this event came from Mallala, Oregon, where this run has been a tradition for over 20 years and morphed into a community event, where members come together to help multiple families. In Mallala, ‘Spread the Love’ lasts three to four weeks and involves the whole community: hosting restaurant nights, participating in a polar plunge, after school assemblies and runs just like Beaham’s. In his last year as a cross country coach,
cross country kids, East alums, parents and Beaham’s friends showed up to “Spread the Love.” While some couldn’t make it to the run, people Venmoed her to still show their love and support for the East community and the outreach to Oregon families.
Beaham first felt inspired to have her team give back about 20 years ago when she, Stiffen and a few other cross country coaches set up a running camp at Shadowcliff Mountain Lodge in Grand Lake, Colorado. At the camp, schools would each bring about 20 athletes to run the mountain trails lined with meadows of wildflowers in an effort to learn about environmental sustainability.
“When we are out there we are not only learning about running and learning about these other kids from across the country,” Beaham said. “We are also learning about ways to protect the nature that surrounds us and that we get to run in everyday.”
After seeing what impact this group of athletes and young adults could make in their community, Beaham wanted to find more ways to give back.
For Beaham and Sniffen alike, cross country wasn’t just an excuse to run. This team and the East program that Beaham has built have been giving back to the community whether that be learning about recycling in Shadowcliff or raising money for community members during the 2/14 run.
Beaham has made it her overlying purpose as a coach, teacher and friend to implement giving back in her community, and having the run on Valentine’s Day was the perfect excuse to show her love to the runners, coworkers and community Beaham explained.
“Tricia describes coaching as selfish,” Beaham’s high school friend Leslie Blair said. “She says that she gets more out of it than the kids, and those kids, they just love her.”
At the start of the race, Tricia told all of the kids and adults to take off their watches — a runner’s prized possession to stay on pace. There was confusion until Beaham described a challenge where the runners would have to guess their paced time and the top six closest to their actual time would receive a prize. The kids hesitated, and some even tried to hide their watch under their sleeve, but Beaham eventually got them to put them in a pile.
This run went better than she could have imagined — she finished the race still smiling and with her goal of creating excitement around the 2.14 mile run fulfilled.
“I know what these kids can do in and outside of their running capabilities,” Beaham stated. “They are fun, bright kids who have so much potential in and outside of our community.”