Brooksie Way Trial Race Gives Runners a Chance to Practice the Hilly Course

There weren't any chip timers, cheering stations or shotgun starts at the Brooksie Way training race on Saturday morning.

Nor were there any official winners.

Unless you talked to Roger Blake.

The Saturday morning trial run for the big Oct. 2 race through Rochester and Rochester Hills was the first-ever run by Blake, a dad of two from Berkley.

Blake joined the in the spring.

"When I started out this program, in the spring, I couldn't even run a mile," he said.

"And look — I just ran three."

Blake was among about 350 runners and walkers on Saturday morning. Most did the half-marathon course, which took them from the campus through Rochester and Rochester Hills along the Clinton River Trail and over the hills of Tienken, Brewster, Dutton and Adams roads.

"It's a good chance for runners to get used to the hills and to the course," said Dianne VanDaele of Shelby Township, a group leader in the training program.

Online registration for the Brooksie Way ends Sept. 29; for more coverage of the event, see the Brooksie Way page on Rochester Patch.