Race honors longtime director
For many years, two names were synonymous with the Crim 10-mile road race.
One, of course, was Bobby Crim, the man for whom the event was named in 1977.
Another was Lois Craig, the Crim's race director for its first 17 years.
Starting in 2001, Craig's name was attached to a Crim event. The Friday night Special Olympics race was named the Lois Craig Invitational for Special Olympics.
"I was dumbfounded when they told me," Craig told Flint Journal reporter Bill Khan in August 2001. "I couldn't believe it. That's very, very nice."
"I think it's a great honor and one she certainly deserves," Crim executive director Sherlynn Everly told Khan in 2001.
Even when she left her job as director, Craig remained part of the Crim behind the scenes as a volunteer and worked closely in with Michigan Special Olympics, the charity for which the Crim was created.
"As soon as I resigned from the Crim, I immediately started working out there, trying to continue raising dollars for Special Olympics," Craig said.
"I think I went out there the first morning. In reality, that's what the whole thing was about from the very beginning. That was the reason Bobby wanted to do something, so he could raise some dollars for the program."
In 2005, about 65 Special Olympians participated.
In 2003, when the Swartz Creek Marching Band - which joined the annual event in 1991 - lead racers to the start line with the "Rocky" theme, about 90 Special Olympians participated.
"The athletes get really excited and so do their parents. It's a great thing to see 'em," said Jerry Daunt, Michigan Special Olympics director for Genesee and Lapeer counties.
The Friday night event was added in 1988, when Special Olympians competed in three heats. Trophies were awarded to the first three finishers in each heat that year.
Now, every participant goes home with a medal.
The 2006 race will begin at 6 p.m. Aug. 26, on S. Saginaw Street in downtown Flint.
