The 25 cross country runners from Detroit Catholic Central High School who returned home this weekend after two weeks of living in tents in a Canadian park can thank Lou Miramonti and their coach, Tony Magni, for the experience.
Miramonti got the idea of training runners far from home from legendary Detroit Redford coach Bruce Waha.
In 1962, Miramonti, a sprinter and quarter-miler at Detroit St. Joseph during his prep days, was student-teaching at Redford, and coaching at the same time at Detroit St. Anthony.
“Bruce would take his team to the Upper Peninsula for 10 days. I thought, why not longer?”
The notion germinated after Miramonti read about the routine of famed Australian distance runner Herb Elliott, 1,500-meter gold medalist at the 1960 Rome Olympics. “He’d go to the outback for a couple months and live like a hermit.”
Magni was one of Miramonti’s runners at St. Anthony. “We became good friends. He helped me get my first coaching job, at Grosse Pointe St. Paul.”
After four years, Magni moved on to Orchard Lake St. Mary’s for three years and, then, in 1973, to Catholic Central. This fall marks the beginning of his 42nd year with the Shamrocks, during which time CC has won state titles in cross country in 1983-84-89-2001-09-10 and 26 Catholic League championships.
Miramonti spent the last 18 years (1970-88) of a 27-year career as coach and athletic director at Royal Oak Shrine, where he directed the Knights to back-to-back Class B state cross country championships in 1973 and 1974.
“This year is our 50th in a row at the Pinery,” exclaims Magni about the Canadian provincial park near Grand Bend, Ontario, that Miramonti chose as his own kind of “outback,” ideal for a running camp.
The 6,300-acre park hugs the Lake Huron shoreline, two hours from Metro Detroit over the Blue Water Bridge in Port Huron.
Magni, who operates the camp alone since Miramonti’s retirement, describes the typical routine: the boys run daily — morning and evening — over hills and sand dunes, concluded by an 18-mile run on the eve of the camp’s close. They’ll cover more than 200 miles.
The boys sleep two or three to a tent on cots or in sleeping bags. “In the early years,” Miramonti recollects, “the kids used canvas army tents that always leaked when it rained.”
The boys wash up in the lake or bike to a nearby town for showers. The per-person fee of $350 that Magni charges covers rental of the park’s facilities as well as provisions and supplies.
Meals and snacks are available at the camp or the boys go to nearby towns. The pasta dinners prepared by Magni’s wife, Linda, and sister, Catherine, are “a big hit.”
The afternoons are moments for relaxation, maybe a nap, card games, etc. There’s a canoe race where the losing team’s “prize” is washing dishes. One afternoon they visit London an hour away and, Magni says, “I let them loose in a mall.”
In the camp’s beginning, runners were welcomed from other CHSL schools, but in the last 10-15 years, Magni restricts participation to CC runners, and by his invitation only.
Magni derives satisfaction hearing former runners reminisce about their experience at the camp. Lifelong friendships develop.
One example, he says, is that between Tim Sullivan from Brother Rice and CC’s Mike Nugent, who met at the camp, ran together at Hillsdale College, have been each other’s best man and godfather for each other’s children.
Shrine’s Tere (nee Stouffer) Drenth — the 1983 Class B champion, “my best female runner,” says Miramonti — has co-authored several marathon training manuals for the “Dummies” series.
Now that they are home in their own beds, the CC runners face more two-a-day workouts in preparation for the upcoming season — giving them another reason to be thankful for the camp: they’re ready for the challenge.
Don Horkey may be reached at [email protected].
