Hello Raven Runners!
Last Sunday was a bit chilly – there was frost on the ground at 6am as your volunteers arrived for the race day setup. It quickly warmed up as the sun got higher in the sky.
The drought conditions and red flag fire warning prevented us from having a fire pit this year unfortunately. But the s’mores fixings were available raw for anyone who wanted to grab a chocolate bar, graham cracker, or marshmallow post race!
2024 PHOTOS
First and foremost – the PHOTOS from this year are available here: https://leathermansloop.smugmug.com/Raven-Rocks-Run/2024
Thank you to photographers Carol, Mark, Bill, Dean, Orion, Rob, plus runners and spectators who sent in or tagged us in photos!
If you have any to upload – click or tap here: https://leathermansloop.smugmug.com/upload/cfVpF2/2024 to share with everyone in the 2024 Raven Rocks Run runner upload gallery.
Raven Rocks 2024 Results
Congratulations to the 286 runners who finished the race on Sunday! The race day was backed by a team of around 40 race volunteers including registration and t-shirt table help, kitchen/food setup, course checkers, timing volunteers, photographers, parking crew, the utility team, and more.
We also could not have put on the race without the help of Ward Pound Ridge Reservation staff — led by Taro Ietaka and helped by Mike Vogt and Mario Rodriguez (who also ran in the race!) plus others at the Rez. We also want to thank the County of Westchester Department of Parks, Recreation, and Conservation for hosting us at the park. The Lewisboro Volunteer Ambulance Corps came to the race to be on standby to help in case of injury.
The race supports the Friends of Trailside Museum and Ward Pound Ridge Reservation. Participants have the opportunity to join the Friends group during registration — and nearly 80 of you took advantage. You can STILL JOIN the friends group via this link: https://runsignup.com/Race/Donate/NY/CrossRiver/RavenRocksRun
Friends of Trailside Membership is at any dollar level. Give what you can. The most popular level is the $100 “Wood Turtle” level which gets the member a year long parking pass for the Rez. We raised over $6,000 for the friends group through the membership program on the registration website this year. Thank you Raven Runners, Hikers, and Walkers!
Musical Guests
We also featured the return of the Pell Hill band of Casey Stanford (Guitar) and Layne Krulik (Drums) rocking mile 5.5 at Pell Hill in the meadow next to the “Town Line Tree” for the second year. They were joined this year by vocalist Ellie Tsiropanas.
Runners heard Led Zeppelin, Metallica, and many other rockin’ tunes as they headed (mostly) downhill towards the finish around 3/4 mile away. The band members currently attend John Jay Middle School. Our thanks to them for braving the cold morning — and thanks to their roadies for getting them there! We hope they will come back for another return engagement!
Cobweb Crew
The Cobweb Crew is a group of runners that go out well before the race and run the course to check that the markings are still there and everything is set for the race. We are confident in our trail course setting ability, but the whims of four legged (and two legged) creatures can lead to unplanned new paths. We rely on the cobweb crew for this vital service — which helps to keep all raven runners and hikers on course.
The Cobweb Crew is comprised of some of the SundayRuns.org crew — trail runners who come out for group runs every Sunday morning at 8am (and other days and times!) to run local (and occasionally more distant) trails.
Race Highlights
The race had one repeat winner this year and one new winner.
Katie Claiborne (57:17) won for the first time and Eamonn Sullivan (43:24) won for the third time. Both runners set new Raven Rocks course records due to the new slightly longer course due to starting in the grass field rather than the meadow triangle. Though Eamonn’s time was a record even for the standard shorter course.
The youngest finishers were a pair of 9-year olds running the race for the SECOND time: Christian Piddington and Wyatt Nable.
All in all a very fun and energetic Sunday. Thank you to all who came, ran, helped, and watched. A great day all around!
Note: If you have registered for the Raven 100k November Challenge please report your distances here: https://runsignup.com/Race/Results/25402#resultSetId-431881;perpage:100 and submit your Raven Woodallion Badge Claims here: https://ravenrocksrun.org/raven-100k-challenge-badge-submission-form/.
If you haven’t registered for the 100k November Challenge you can still sign up – today (11/16) is the last day though!
Thanks for helping make it a very Ravember month!
….Rob
Photo Gallery for 2024 (and prior years!)
We have a group of volunteer photographers (thank you Carol, Orion, Mark, Dean, Bill, and Rob) who came out to the race to help document the event. Their 2024 photos are available on our permanent gallery website here: https://leathermansloop.smugmug.com/Raven-Rocks-Run/2024
Links to prior years photos (2015-2023) is at this link: https://ravenrocksrun.org/photos/
Lastly – if you have photos YOU’D like to share (and be able to find years later!) post them to the 2024 runner’s upload album gallery using this link: https://leathermansloop.smugmug.com/upload/cfVpF2/2024
Runners also share photos and video via Instagram – tag us @ravenrocksrun https://www.instagram.com/ravenrocksrun/
Some selected photos from 2024:
