Episode #561: Running for Life-Tony Reed on Health, Community, and Breaking Barriers in Distance Running

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I am super excited to announce that we now have a formal

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partnership with the Prospect Wizard. And when I say

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wizard, I mean wizard. Obviously you have a website.

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This allows you to convert your website traffic visitors

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club instantly. MIT shows a study that if you contact

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the league within 10 minutes, chance of them converting goes up nine

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times. That of the average. We got the Atlanta clubs

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on it. Vita Fitness, Gold's Gym, Mountainside

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City Fitness, Philly, College Park. Become one

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of the next halo companies to deploy the Wizard.

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It's easy to use. Go to the prospectwizard.com

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get a free 30 day trial. Talk to my boy Dave Gallon. He will get

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you all set up and let the leads flow based on the

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Wizard. Go get him.

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This is Pete Moore on Helo Talks nyc. I have the pleasure of

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bringing a longtime distinguished marathoner, a

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very adept CPA and a grandfather who

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lets his grandkids use all of his awards and medals.

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Coming to you live from Dallas, Texas, Tony Reed.

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Welcome to the show. Thank you very much for having me. It's great being

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here. Awesome. Well, as we talked earlier, you know,

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you and I are on a parallel path, mission to get people moving,

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get people running, try to make sure that we don't get them into the

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pharmaceutical industry, which they'll never get out of, and take,

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take a little bit more control and responsibility

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for themselves. So you know, maybe harking back to, to, to how you

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started running back in the 70s and you know how this kind of

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became something that you're like, look, I got to take control, I got to do

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this. Yes. Well, I was about 7 or 8 years old

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when they found out that I was pre diabetic and the doctor said

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that I would probably go on insulin by the time I was a teenager.

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So every year I was having to go to the Juvenile Diabetes association

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to get tested to determine whether or not I would go on ins.

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I went to a high school where it was mandatory, not optional, but

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mandatory. Every student had to participate in a sport two

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out of the three seasons and that third season they had to take pe.

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So I ended up going to high school, got involved in sports, lost weight,

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did not have to go on insulin, but we really didn't understand

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why. Then in college again it was

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mandatory that you take pen. And there I

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read the book called aerobics by Dr. Kenneth Cooper.

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And then later, he wrote the book New Aerobics. And in New

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Aerobics, there was one paragraph that said diabetics who were dependent on

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insulin could either decrease their intake or go completely off

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of it if they maintain a fitness program. So in

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1976, I set a lifetime goal of

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averaging what I would say. Running, walling, running,

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walking or crawling, three miles a day. I've kept

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handwritten running journals since 1979,

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and as of this year, I've run over

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51,000 miles average,

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exactly 3.07 miles a day.

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I'll be 70 this year, and I'm still not on insulin.

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Amazing. Congratulations. I had a. I had a story that I

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got to interject here, because I probably was. Was in that same code

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of potentially having diabetes. Wasn't a kid, but I wasn't

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tested for it. But I'll tell you what happened, and you tell me if I

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was probably at risk. So back. I grew up in Long

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island and about 30 minutes outside New York, and it was a

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suburban area. So the ice cream man would have that jingle and come

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around up my block, you know, every five or six days a

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week. And my dad ran a company. He was. Always had a lot of change,

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like quarters and dimes and nickels. I don't know why, but he. He'd always

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empty out his. His pockets, you know, the. The next

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when he came home. And there was this nice little, like, bin of, like,

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quarters. It was like a blue thing maybe my grandmother made. It was, like,

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embroidered. And I'm like, hey, can I just, you know, take out of there if

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I need something? He's like, yeah, sure. I don't care. So the ice cream man

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would come. I would literally take my left hand. I'd grab as much as I

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could in quarters. And when the ice cream man came, I would buy Fun Dip,

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which is basically like sugar in a little pouch, right, with the

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applicator. Then I would buy Big League Chew Grape, which

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was basically like, all sugar with. With gum. And then I would buy

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candy, cigarettes, and I would take them all and I put them under my radiator.

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And then when my mom says, okay, you gotta go to sleep, I basically eat

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all that stuff like 30 minutes before I slept. So I was on a huge

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sugar rush at, like 10, 11, 12. And the

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result of that was I got chubby and I had to shop. I don't know

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if you had this where you grew up in St. Louis, but there was Sears,

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you know, S, E, A, R S. And. And they had this

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is before, like mental health awareness, Tony. They

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had a section of the kids section called the husky department.

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Husky. I had to go there and get elastic corduroy

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jeans. Okay. And it was the most demoralizing thing

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that you could do when you got elastic jeans is 10, 11, 12. So I

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became a goalie in soccer because I didn't want to run because I

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was eating too much sugar at night and somehow I didn't get diabetes and I

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leaned out and I was actually a good athlete. But know you can either get

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diabetes genetically or you could actually like force feed it to yourself. Which might have

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been what I did. Yes. Well, when I was in high school,

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I worked every weekend at a barbecue restaurant

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and there was a Bill, sorry, there was a cook whose name was Bill.

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And Bill wore a patch over one of his eyes and it

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turns out he had to wear that patch due to

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glaucoma. So he had lost sight in that eye due to glaucoma.

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And over about a six year period he had his toes

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amputated, his leg amputated, and ultimately lost

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his life. All due to complications associated with diabetes.

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And I don't even think he was probably in his, probably mid to late

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40s. Wow. Wow. And I decided, you know, that I

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wanted to live long enough to see my grandkids, maybe to walk my

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daughter down the aisle when she got married and really just to do all these

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things that I couldn't do them if I was dead. Yeah. Amazing.

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So, so when did you actually say like there's some people say,

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hey, I'm part of a movement, you know, I want to help other people that

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are doing this. And there's some people like you, me, and you know, the, the,

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the type AERs that say I'm not just going to like get involved. Like I'm

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actually going to create an entity. I'm actually going to drive this thing. It's going

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to be a legal thing. I'm going to like devote a certain amount of time.

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Obviously you do a marathons, which is a significant amount of time

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allocation. You also have a day job, your cpa, which isn't like

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back in the day, like we people don't remember. Like there was no Excel,

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there was no like online QuickBooks. Like you had to do this stuff like on

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a general ledger, right? Yeah. And like, like big lengthy pieces of

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paper. No one appreciates what it used to be to actually get work done as

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far as I'm concerned. So beta CPA back in the day, by the way, was

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not moving files around Microsoft Outlook for the listeners here, it

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was actually very detailed, you know, ledger work, probably pen and paper

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at some point, maybe moved up. So what, what kind of.

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What was the inertia to say? Was it to cook or was it like, hey,

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I just got to set up an association like formalizes.

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Well, I was, in 2001, I was

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speaking at a data processing conference up in

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Chicago. And while I was there, I mentioned that I had a

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goal of running 50 marathons before I turned 50 years old. And I

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had run by then something like 47 marathons.

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And I really wasn't thinking anything of it because I was just out there

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running the marathons by myself, at least going to races by

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myself. And a group of African Americans pulled me

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aside after I got off the stage and they said, we've never met anyone who

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has ever run that many marathons. And

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so they said, when you get ready to run your 50th, let us know.

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And in talking with all of them, all of them had somewhat similar

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stories as far as having family members who have diabetes,

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people suffering from high blood pressure, hypertension, as I like

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to call all of the diseases of inactivity.

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So when I got ready to run my 50th marathon, they came and joined me

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and we started talking about, you know, about possibly

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starting an organization that would focus on

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African Americans to get us up and

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moving. And what I ended up doing is putting together

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kind of a three part program, if you want

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to call it that, focus on education, training and

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sustainability. So the education side of it

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focuses on dispelling the myths about African Americans as

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distance runners. Because for a lot of us,

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when we were in school, as soon as you said you wanted to run a

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mile, you know, people say, well, you know, well, African Americans are

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sprinters, not distance runners.

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Even, even with, like back in the day when you had like the New York

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Marathon or the Boston Marathon, it would. Like some of the guys that

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are winning now, like, they weren't coming to the US to do that. Right. Or

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the Olympics. How'd it work? Well, the. The guys that were winning

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the marathons were coming over from Africa. Yeah, yeah. So they were

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doing long distance. Right. So when you look at African Americans.

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Yeah, we were all focused on. At least coaches were focusing us

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on running the sprints. Yeah, I got you. Okay. And if you were a distance

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runner, they would just go to the track, run a few laps around, and,

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you know, that was your workout. Gotcha, Gotcha. Okay. So

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there's. There's this huge myth that African Americans are Sprinters and not

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distance runners. Okay. And of course, there

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were also things about women running as far as the uterus, which

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we're going to drop out, and all these different things, and how

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running is bad for your knees, it's bad for your hips.

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So the education side of our program focused on dispelling

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all those myths. Today we actually have two

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documentaries. Oh, really? Yes. And I actually wrote

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and directed both of them. One of them is called Spare Time.

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Yes. Love it. So one of the documentaries

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is called Breaking 3 Trailblazing African American Women

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Marathoners. And that documentary came

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out in 2022. In

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2023, Runner's World magazine listed

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it as one of the most motivational and inspirational running documentaries of all

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time. Amazing. Where can people get that?

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That's available on just about all the different streaming services. It's out

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on YouTube Prime Video.

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So, yeah, that one is out there every place. Amazing. The

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second one that just came out this year is called

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We Are Distance Runners. Untold Stories of African American

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Athletes. So that one focused

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on six distance runners who ran

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distances everywhere from the half mile

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all the way up to running across the. Literally the running from LA

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to New York, and talks about their stories

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of overcoming poverty, the. The naysayers,

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and just all the different obstacles that. That we have, including

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major illnesses.

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This is Pete Moore. I want to let you in on a little secret. There's

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this company called Promotion Vault. And what they do is they give. Out rewards

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from retailers that allow you to incentivize your members

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without having to do 0 down and 1 month free or

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giving away shakes or giving away T shirts. What you want to do is

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build a rewards program that lasts, that people value

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and that doesn't discount your own products and services. So here's the

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deal. There's something called Rewards Vault. The Rewards Vault is going

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to allow a member to set up their own profile. They are going

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to answer questions, you are going to get those answers, you're going to be able

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to target those members, and you're going to reward them inside your

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club, inside your spa, and outside of the club and outside

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of the spa to get them to become loyal, to get them to pay

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their monthly dues and to be rewarded properly for

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the actions. A lot of companies are cutting back on rewards. You shouldn't be

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Promotion vaults. Your answer, trust me, this is real.

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A couple questions for you related to what you're doing right

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now is you're trying to, you know, encourage people to get moving,

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encourage people to, you know, register into

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marathons, maybe create you know, communities or groups, what

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level? And, and the reason why I'm asking this question is, like,

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you could take this into so many different. You could go really deep on what

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you're doing, or you can say, like, hey, there's like a directory. You. Here's all

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the events you could go to. There could be potential partnerships as people

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listening to our call right now with groups that have a

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reasonably sized African American population either already inside of their

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health club membership base or that they don't have. And they should actually have

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a relationship, whether it's a Gold's Gym, whether it's an Equinox, whether it's

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a Barry's Poot camp. What are some of the things? Or is there anyone inside

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the company that's looking for bricks and mortar partnerships or marketing

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partners? Because I think that's where we can be helpful. And also, it's very hard

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for health club members to get above this. 20% of the

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population, maybe 30% now belong to a health club chain. And

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maybe, you know, having connectivity with a group like yours kind of makes

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it easier because they have a goal that they're walking into.

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Okay, well, good. That actually gets into the. The second,

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second part of our program, and that's focuses on training. So

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one of the things that we've done is we've encouraged our members to

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get their coaching certifications either through the Roadrunners Club of

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America or USA Track and Field.

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Then once they get their certifications, for example, they could

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partner with a health club, and

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within that health club, they can actually have a distance running club.

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And they can always meet up there at the facilities to start to

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start their different training runs and kind of start off

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with what we call a couch to 5K training program. Gotcha.

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And those programs are on your site. And then you can maybe like, have them

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linked into a health club chain or they could like, take it and

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like, reference the source. Well, once a person gets

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their certified coaches training, for example, especially with the Road Runners Club

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of America, they work with them on putting together

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training programs for individuals who want to kind of

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start a running program, because it's really different for everyone. Got

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it. So a standpoint of actually, like, setting up communities.

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I was on a rant the other day with one of our health club

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operators who had very high attrition rates, and they're losing like half

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their members a year. And I'm like,

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what's going on? I got some people, like, are leaving because they. They play pickleball.

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We don't have a pickleball court. Some people are leaving because you know, our

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indoor cycling is not what it used to be or, and allows people want

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outdoor cycling anyway. They're just here to like do. And I'm like, if you

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take back to like college there are all these like student

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led activity

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groups, right? None of those were like, there was no, there was nobody from the

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school that like said, I'm like, hey, I'm in the, I'm the Runners club. The

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Runners club is you know, somebody who's like a senior, you know, in

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college. And then people joined and then they, you know, selected and it was,

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it was 100%, you know, student led. And what I've been trying to get these

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health club members to say is like look, you don't have to have a pickleball

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court, have like two people that are, that are pickleball advocates

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and, and, and play every week and just like say hey, you want to play

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pickleball? We don't have pickleball. However, I got four workout

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recovery sessions a week pre and post pickleball that I'm

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going to make you better at pickleball and then talk to Joe and Sally because

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they were on the pickleball team and gave us shirts, right. So I

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feel like there's like a wide open lane, if you will,

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for you to say, okay, I'm going to take my association. I'm going to either

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you find someone inside that club that's a, that's a runner and affiliate

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with you to say, hey, I'm run, I'm ahead of the, you know, I'm ahead

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of the Runners club here, right? And you know the, the

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NBN MA is, is we got MBMA

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affiliate or like what is it in, in like a ro.

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Ro, like in the army, right? Rotc. They got a

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ROTC on campus type of thing. Hey, I've got a, I've got. Our group is

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inside. These health clubs can be super interesting as I'm thinking

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aloud. Yeah, well with us we actually don't

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have clubs in different cities around the country because we feel on a

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local basis they know what's best for their community.

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Now what health clubs can do is once they get a

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running club started, the way they keep things going is they can

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pick for example a race just about once a quarter

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that they want everyone to train towards, you know, to train towards that

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particular race. So they may start off the first

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race, maybe a 5k, a 10k, a half marathon and then maybe even

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up to a marathon and then what they would

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do to get the People to come to the health club is one of the

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most important parts about distance running is strength training and stretching.

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So if the running. So if the health

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club, they may not have a lot of treadmills, but people

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can again start and finish their runs there. And on their off

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days they can say, yeah, I need to go in, I need to work on

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my quads, I need to work on my calves, I need to build up my

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upper body strength. Yep. And that's where they could get,

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take advantage of all the facilities that are there at the health club.

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Yeah, agree. So just to, to, to close out this, this

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idea. If there is a running club that is already inside

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of a health club that we get to through our relationships, they don't have a

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relationship with you and your association, what would

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your association provide to them that would optimize what they're currently doing?

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Well, the thing that we can provide are role models

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so that you can go and you can look at the individuals, for example, who

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have been inducted into our hall of Fame. You have a lady there

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named Lisa Felder. So Lisa Felder at one point

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weighed over 230 pounds. She

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changed her exercise habits, she changed

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her eating habits, and she ended up losing all

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the weight. And Lisa Felder went on to run over

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400 marathons and ultra marathons. So here you're looking at

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races that are over 50 miles. And

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so you can hold her up as a role model. You

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have again, a lot of different people in there who come from a

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lot of different backgrounds that if you can

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take, if anyone says that they have a problem in a particular area,

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we can find someone in our hall of Fame who had the same problem and

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who overcame it and excelled at distance running. Got it.

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Is that sortable database or like, can you put in, is it like

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tagged, meta tag or anything? Yeah, all they have to do

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is just go to our website, which is blackmarathoners.org we

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have a drop down link for hall of Fame and you can see all the

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different individuals that have been inducted into the hall of Fame as well as the

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background stories. Awesome, awesome. And with the association, are

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you a nonprofit like 501c3 and do you

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take donations in? That's a very good question. We are

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a nonprofit organization. It is free to join.

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So people can't use a lack of a membership. People

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can't use a membership fee as a reason not to join. Right. Because

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our sole mission is to get people out there running and to get

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them active. So how many

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people do you think. You'Ve affected or since you started.

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Wow. We have over 16,000.

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For example, in our Facebook group,

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we have founders of running other running

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organizations, used to be members of our organization.

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And just kind of taking it that one step out, we have

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impacted well over a quarter million African Americans

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in this country. Bravo, man. Man, hats off. That's awesome. I love

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hearing that. I think sometimes people want to build something really big

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and they forgot that you should start small and figure out what you're doing,

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how it resonates. And as an analogy, like, somebody will start up,

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like one health club, and then they'll build 10, but they don't really know what

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they built yet. And they would come to us and say, like, you know, with

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a CPA like yourself, be like, hey, I need to raise money. I want to

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build another hundred. And I'll say, which one's the prototype? And they

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would say, the 11th one. And I'm like, wrong answer, man. You got to

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come to me after you've lived in it, after you figured it out, after you

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tell me it works. And then like, that experiment, you know,

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could turn into something big, and you need capital to fund the experiment. So

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it sounds like from your standpoint, you're like, hey, how can I affect people

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locally? And then let it, like, blossom and control

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it and figure out where it goes, you know, down this,

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down the highway, Right? On a. On a marathon. I'm running a marathon. You weren't

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running. You were never running a sprint with this. I guess is another

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way to say it. Yeah. And what we do is we provide. We

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provide a platform at our annual summits where we

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can get individuals from running clubs all around the country

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to congregate together and encourage them to share

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ideas and concepts about how to go about making their running clubs

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larger and how to go about better servicing their local communities.

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When's the next summit? The next summit, believe it or not, is

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this weekend coming up. It's going to be at the One City

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Marathon race weekend in Newport News,

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Virginia. Oh, good for you. And in fact, we're actually going to be

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screening both of the documentaries there. And it's free.

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And again, it's free for people to go and watch the documentaries.

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This is Pete Moore. Here's the last tip for you of the podcast.

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We are partnered up with a company called higher dose

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00:22:46,930 --> 00:22:50,290
higherdose.com they are the leader in

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00:22:50,530 --> 00:22:53,490
workout recovery products, infrared technology,

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00:22:54,210 --> 00:22:57,730
LED light masks, neck enhancers, and

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00:22:57,890 --> 00:23:01,610
other products such as PEMF mats and sauna

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00:23:01,610 --> 00:23:04,860
blankets. If you have not gotten on the workout

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Recovery train yet your time and your stop

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00:23:08,460 --> 00:23:11,980
is now. You got to get these products in there before these workout

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00:23:11,980 --> 00:23:15,180
recovery and spas end up saturating your market.

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Having your members walk out of the club and going into one of their locations

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00:23:19,100 --> 00:23:22,780
for 200 bucks per month where they're paying 39 to

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00:23:22,780 --> 00:23:26,500
you. Let's become an expert in workout recovery. If

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00:23:26,500 --> 00:23:29,940
we are already an authority in workouts, higher dose,

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00:23:30,340 --> 00:23:34,020
check it out. There's a wholesale code and we look

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forward to helping you augment your products and services

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to meet the demands of your members. And hey, let's get people

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happy, healthy and sweating. And the recovery should be

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just as good as the workout.

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So. So in closing here, if you had advice for your

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younger self or if you had advice for, know, somebody

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who's coming out of undergrad or coming out of business school and they want to,

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you know, have a career and they also want to help people, is there

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anything that you would say I should have done a little bit differently or like,

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you know, maybe like a couple words of wisdom from a guy's got already

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grandkids and thousands of awards behind him. That's not a screen

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share tool. I would say

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be very realistic. You know, you're not going to be able to,

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to do everything at one time, so it's just a matter of pacing

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yourself. You know, think as they say,

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think in terms of what's good for the long run.

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I like that. And also resting is just

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as important as running. Awesome. Man.

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I'm glad we met. I'm not sure how we met, but welcome to the halo

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sector officially. I'd love to be helpful to you guys as much as

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possible with getting into some of the more traditional bricks and mortar

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groups that have everything that you need, but don't really know

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that your association is out there or that there are

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communities and pockets of people that they need to

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00:25:04,300 --> 00:25:08,020
market to and they need to embrace because

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once you, once you move into lifestyle, it's not like you don't, you don't

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exit out like you're in, you know, you're in for the long term. So,

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so yeah, this year is our 20 year anniversary. So we've been doing

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this for a long time. That's great. That's great. And

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that's, that's coming up this weekend, like in two days. Important news. Yes.

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Okay. I won't get the podcast out before then, but have a great trip

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00:25:30,310 --> 00:25:34,150
and journey and we'll hit you up when we post this

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00:25:34,150 --> 00:25:37,870
up and see how we can make some high level connections. Okay. Great

414
00:25:37,870 --> 00:25:40,990
it's been. Thank. Thank you for having me. Yeah. And feel free to use the

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00:25:40,990 --> 00:25:43,590
term halo if you don't like the word wellness. If you see wellness coming out,

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you can just take it back in, get a good nose, breathe as you do

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on your marathon. On. And like, you know, mile 22, be like, oh, I'm in

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00:25:49,730 --> 00:25:53,410
halo sector. Okay. All right, man. Awesome.

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Sa.