The Newcomer's Guide to Running in Ithaca—comments and suggestions?

In an effort to make runners who are new to Ithaca feel more at home and find their way in the running community, I’ve whipped up The Newcomer’s Guide to Running in Ithaca (with help from @Petorius and @tonya-engst). It will eventually migrate to the FLRC website, but for the moment, I’m soliciting comments and suggestions and edits from the community. Feel free to make small changes in the document itself (in Suggesting mode so I can see them), and raise any larger suggestions here so we can discuss.

@Ian, it would be great if you could make sure my descriptions of the shop and Red Newt Racing are right. And @jullfly, perhaps you could get the new Ithaca Triathlon Club officers to check—it would be ideal if they had a presence here on the forum too.

I think one thing that might be worth directly pointing out the best way to find people to run with is through the forum. I think it’s somewhat addressed in the section about the club but I would put it more front and center as I think it’s one of the first questions newcomers have. Otherwise I think this is great!

Thanks for the suggestion! I’ll beef up that advice and make it more explicit.

I think it looks great, Adam! What a nice resource for newbies! What do you think about mentioning IYB for kids?

See, this is why I ask for feedback! I’ll definitely add a section about IYB’s youth running programs. I should also look into adding some brief bits about at least Ithaca’s scholastic running teams—I know we found it confusing when Tristan wanted to run modified cross country, and that was even when Tonya had run for IHS as a high school student and the same guy (Rich Bernstein) was coaching.

Great resource, thanks Adam and colleagues.

Maybe add to the Trails section: “An easy way to get into running the Finger Lakes Trail is to drive/bike/bus to a trailhead and do out/back one direction for half your run time, out/back the other for the remainder.”

Also: “Be aware, some sections of the FLT are closed during hunting season, always check the FLT on-line map and trail conditions reports”.

Great suggestion—added!