Mixing running and a social element with a pub seems like both an irony and a great idea. Michael L. Yowell, club president, and a former military commander now working in the civilian sector became aware of Jack Quinn’s Running Club through some of the soldiers under his command. Based out of Jack Quinn’s Irish Pub on South Tejon Street he found that it is not just a social club but also a lifestyle and a way of life.
On one evening in October, Yowell said they had 331 check-ins with 17 new runners. Since the start of 2022, Jack Quinn’s Running Club has had 1,875 people who have checked in one or more times. In 2022 alone, 673 new runners have come out. And since they started their first run in 2006, 41,711 people have run at least once with the club. Those numbers show the power of community with a specific focus: to run and hang together
“There is one person who’s in the 700 Run Club, which is 700 club runs. He was also the guy who was my training partner who initially encouraged me to join.” Yowell’s training partner was also the previous club president. “There’s a lot of us that have worked our way through the club. I mean, for me, I’m at 635 club runs and I joke with people I’m a newbie. And people come in and they’re amazed that we’re at that level.”
What Constitutes a “Run” with Jack Quinn’s Running Club?
A “run” is the completion of a 5K route from Jack Quinn’s through Monument Valley Park and back to the pub. “You can Google plenty of different map references. There’s also a YouTube video that was shot during the pandemic by a guy who took his GoPro, started at the front of Jack Quinn’s Pub, and walked the route. Of course, you’re not watching a 60-minute video, it’s sped up. But it’s the exact same route that we have on our map.”
The route follows the pathway that goes up and down Fountain Creek and then goes up the hill to Uintah Avenue near Colorado College. “A lot of those paths have been around or were built by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the 1930s public works of The Great Depression,” Yowell says his mother and grandmother who live a little bit north of the route used to pick wild dandelions along the path.
Yowell says the club brings all kinds of people together. “People move to the Springs. They don’t know a soul. Next thing you know, they’re well-versed in our club. You see families. There are people that have met at Jack Quinn’s Running Club, and the next thing you know, they’re married, and the next thing you know after that, they have kids. And the next thing you know, their kids are now checking in.”
Check-in happens at an upstairs table at the pub on the run night, which happens every Tuesday. Yowell says the club is completely back to in-person after having to do virtual check-in during the pandemic. “And when not if, you come to Quinn’s … I’m going to put the plug into you there … when you come upstairs, there are different beverages for runners, part of the runner’s specials. And one of them is Runners Red, and it is brewed by Bristol Brewing, our long-time sponsor. It has the Jack Quinn’s Running Club logo on it and it is specially brewed by Bristol for the pub and for the running club.”
The Origins of Jack Quinn’s Running Club
The running club dates back to 2006. The owners of Jack Quinn’s: Bill and Donna Sasz, were speaking with a patron Ryan Shininger, who was a recent transplant from Pensacola, Florida. Shininger mentioned that there were no bars around the Springs that sponsored a running club like the one he had belonged to Pensacola, which was also associated with an Irish pub.
Yowell says that a pub is not just a bar. “It’s a public house, and that’s where people go to [and congregate], both for families and gatherings.” The Saszs said they’d support a running club if Ryan would take the lead in putting it together. He reached out to some local places (like Boulder Running Company and eventually Bristol Brewing) and the running club just grew.
The first run of Jack Quinn’s Running Club was on June 6, 2006. “And they were thinking, ‘We might get maybe 10, 20 runners or so,’ and the very first night, there were 70 people who showed up.” Each week the numbers increased, spread by word-of-mouth, and by the end of the summer, there were hundreds of people showing up every Tuesday.
Achieving Milestones and Giving Back
People get shirts and discounts at Jack Quinn’s as they achieve milestones. Yowell explains: “When I got my 10-run shirt, it was also the night our very first ever 200-runner got his 200-run shirt. And that was the night his dad earned his 100-run shirt.”
A 200-runner, Donovan and his dad were “green shirt” volunteers with the club as well as committee members. They acted as team leads to integrate new runners and promote the club. They knew of Yowell’s military background and recruited him to help. Yowell knew a lot of people there. “A lot are military, a lot of them I knew from my running store, or I knew them from different races I was competing in and running in. So, it’s an extended family, and it just kept growing from there.”
While other running clubs have formed in the area over the years, Jack Quinn’s Running Club is still about that family. “Quinn’s is a social running club,” Yowell continues. “But the biggest thing is a sense of family. I mean, you’ve got family that is newborns, toddlers, teenagers, Olympians, to folks that are — and they may not be the fastest ones out there, but they’re still running … those that have been runners for 40, 50, 60, 70 years of their lives, and they’re still here. And when you look around, there’s no family member that you don’t want to talk to. It’s not like Thanksgiving where you’re forced to talk, or you have to suffer through so-and-so. I mean, people look forward to seeing each other. It will be like ‘Hey, I haven’t seen you in a couple of weeks.’ And you start talking about what’s going on in your life.”
