I have received several emails concerning the recent death of A. C. Linnerud, and am posting them as no one else seems to be doing so. I never knew A. C. well, but he was a perennial presence at all the Annual Meetings. He was at one time the holder of the record for lifetime courses measured for certification. A. C. certified 618 courses in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia from 1982 to 1995, and personally measured 537 of them. He was a cheerful guy and good company. He will be missed.
Here are the emails I have received, in the order received. The first was from Paul Hronjak, who informed many of A. C.’s death. I received it on January 20. This opened up the gates for the rest.
From Paul Hronjak:
I just received news that our dear friend passed away yesterday. I have no
further details at this time.
From David Katz:
This is a sad day.
A good man and one of the original members of our family.
He will be missed.
From John Blackburn:
Indeed the end of an era.
Thanks for the message Paul.
AC was one of the first officials I worked with, and I even roomed with him at one of my first TAC conventions.
From Butch Robertson:
Hate hearing this. The Raleigh area and running in general has lost two pillars recently with Tom Hare, who set numerous age division records, and now, AC. Everyone who knew AC seemed to have an "AC Story", which they tell while smiling or laughing. I know I've got dozens.
I saw AC at a movie last January. Jolly and jovial as ever.
Good man.
From Jim Young:
Sorry to hear that, and also sorry that I will be out-of-town next week at
the ChampionChip North American Conference and will be unable to attend any
services.
A.C. was an unique individual. If you went to a dictionary and looked up
the definition of "char-ac-ter," it would probably say, "See Linnerud, A.C."
My first meeting with A.C. was in 1970 when I was teaching Army ROTC at NC
State and also helping Coach Jim Wescott coach track and cross-country. I
remember A.C. jogging around the State track. I had heard that he did his
laps in exactly 2 minutes - not a second faster or a second slower. I
never timed him, but I believed it. Legend has it that he once ran a
marathon on that same track. I assume at an 8 min/mile pace.
I also give credit to A.C. for keeping me away from track meets. If I
wanted to catch a meet and maybe see just one event, that was impossible.
If A.C. was one of the timers (and he always was), he would spot you in the
stands and yell, "Jim, come on down we need another timer." It did not
matter if he had 20 timers already at the finish line, if he had a spare
watch, you were drafted.
It was easy to spot A.C. at track meets, He was the one with the pocket
protector and at least ten pens stuck in it. If the protector wasn't full
of pens, he felt almost naked. One thing I never heard A.C. say (and I am
sure anyone who knew A.C. would agree), "Can I borrow a pen?" He was the
original geek before geeks became cool. "A geek ahead of his time."
But most of my memories of A.C. did not originate on the track, they were
created on the roads.
A. C. was a familiar sight at area road races in the late 70's and 80's.
Armed with one of those old Chronomix printing timers that printed the
times on silver paper, he ruled the finish line. And woe be to the runner
who transgressed in any way.
I was one of those sinners in a 5K in Zebulon. After finishing the race
and going through the chute, I went back to get my girl friend who was
running her first road race to run with her and encourage her. Knowing
enough about racing not to cross the finish line again, I made a 90-degree
turn about 1 yard before the finish line. But, alas, it was too late. A.C.
had timed me. It was the only time I ever recall seeing him upset. Of
course, years later when I went into the business of road race management
on a full-time basis, I realized how he felt. Sorry, A.C., please forgive
me.
But my fondest memories of A.C. were created at "o-dark-thirty" in the
mornings. For years, A.C. was the "go to" man in North Carolina for
certifying race courses.
He preferred meeting early in the morning about 5 a.m. before the commuter
traffic began venturing out. He would ride his bike and my job would to
follow him in his car with the flashers on.
But before beginning to measure, he had to find a can of paint, The back
of his car was a repository of road race history. He would route through
old road race t-shirts, sweats that runners had given him to hold, reams of
forms, and a couple of empty (I hope) Hardee's cups and bags. Finally, he
would pull out a can of spray paint, and we were ready to go. I swear that
one day, we would discover a dead runner in all that rubble.
Despite being known as a compact car. the Chevy Vega was A.C.'s vehicle of
choice. Being a man of sizeable proportions, he said that it was easy for
him to enter and exit that particular model.
I remember in one of his Veags, he had dropped a can of spray paint. It
had either exploded or the spray nozzle had gone wild (I was not there at
the time, thank goodness), but the effect was a completely changed interior.
After measuring the course, we would make the obligatory run to the nearest
Hardee's. There A.C. would pull out his calculator and small spiral
notebook and begin his calculations over breakfast.
Never one to relish getting up several hours before dawn, I once said to
him, "I play poker every Thursday night until 11 p.m.. I usually am not
able to sleep after the game. Instead of measuring courses early in the
morning, why don't we measure one at midnight on a Thursday?" These were
words I would regret.
The next course we had to certify was an out-and-back course on
Hillsborough Street. For those not acquainted with Raleigh, Hillsborough
Street runs by the NC State University campus. A.C. and I quickly learned
that Hillsborough Street with all its taverns is very busy through fare
until 2 a.m. Students came out of the bars to watch a large man on a
bicycle ride down the middle of the street followed by a Vega with an oddly
pained interior. After that experience, 5 a.m. no longer seemed so bad.
Well, good-by, A.C. and I hope the man upstairs has a nice new Vega waiting
for you.
From Ole:
Dear Jim,
I was very touched by your many loving anecdotes about A.C. I knew him much
less well [mostly saw him at the many races he timed], but your thoughts were
terrific in rounding out my impressions.
Many thanks for sharing, and best wishes,
From Walter High:
Dear Friends:
It is truly a sad day for the track and field community. A.C. was the
embodiment of volunteerism; he gave back to the sport thousands of times
over whatever he took from it. His life seemed to be completely centered
around our sport; I never heard him say no to working at an event unless it
was because he was already committed to working at another one at the same
time. Not only will we miss what he did for us, we will miss his great,
jovial personality. A.C. got along with everybody, never had a harsh or
mean word about anyone. He was eternally optimistic and good natured; no
problem was too great to be resolved with the application of just a little
elbow grease.
As Jim Young mentioned, those of us who have known A.C. for many years
remember him in his running days. My first convention for USA Track &
Field was the Constitutional Convention in 1980 when the sport was split
away from the AAU. The meetings were held in Dallas and I was off to my
first administrative event for the sport. I was perfectly ammenable when
the group of other delegates (Bob Baxter, Jerome Perry, Dick Mochrie, etc.)
suggested that I should room with A.C. If I had looked closely, I would
have noticed the smiles hidden behind hands covering fake coughs and I
might have heard the quiet snickering. A.C. truly slept the sleep of the
just. I have never seen anyone who could fall asleep so quickly. With no
exaggeration it is fair to say that he went to sleep within 30 seconds of
putting his head to his pillow. While this never ceased to amaze me
(during an entire week of rooming with him), what did amaze me was the
incredible volume of his snoring. I suddenly understood why the others
were so anxious to make sure the "new guy" got A.C. as a roommate. When I
struggled awake in the mornings after spending hours trying to get to
sleep, A.C.'s bed would be empty and I could look out the window and see
him running lap after lap around the parking lot like clockwork. I don't
remember how many it was, but he knew exactly how many days in a row he had
run without missing, and it was well into the thousands. I believe at
future conventions we often sprung to pay for a single room for A.C.,
unless we could snooker someone else into the roommate swindle!
I too had the opportunity (as many of us probably did) of meeting A.C. at
"0 dark thirty, to use Jim's term, to measure or remeasure a road race
course. I can remember crawling along the edge of a street in the dark
with a flashlight, trying to help A.C. find a nail he had pounded into the
pavement some years earlier as a marker. Invariably streets had been
repaved, curbs installed where they weren't before, or roads rerouted to
some slight degree. All required a remeasurement and a hunt for nails in
the pavement. Jim remarked on the Vega as a repository for everything
associated with road races and track and field. Well Jim, if you ever
visited A.C.'s office at NC State before he retired, everything that didn't
fit into the car was in his office. And that included reams upon reams of
printouts. A.C. was in the Statistics Deparment and he was from the era
when everything out of a computer was produced on that lengthy, green and
white, pin-fed printer paper. I don't think A.C. ever threw away a single
scrap of paper that he came in contact with. And it was all kept in his
office. You could barely get the door open to get inside because of the
piles of printouts everywhere.
A.C. was our first President of TAC as the successor to the AAU. Those
were interesting times as we worked to govern the sport as it separated
from its old roots. A.C. has always been on the Board in some capacity for
the 27 years of our existence, but President was probably not the best
position for him. A.C. had the patience of Job and was loathe to cut off a
discussion before everyone had the opportunity to say their piece. And
with Bob Baxter, Jerome Perry, Dick Mochrie, Bob Boal, Alex Almasey, and
several others on the Board, there was a lot to be said. Meetings were
interminably long, but A.C. never got rattled, never got angry, never lost
his patience. He just never cut anyone off. Over recent years A.C. had to
endure the indignities of the the NCUSATF annual meeting where we elected
delegates to the national convention. There is no one who has worked
harder for our sport, given more of himself, and gone to meetings at
national that no one else wanted to attend, and better represented North
Carolina. Yet when we held our annual meeting, most of the people who had
votes were showing up for the one and only time that year. They did not
know who A.C. was and he often ended up just a couple of votes short of
delegate status. A.C. never was bitter or upset by his failure to be
elected; he just made plans to be at convention and mapped out his driving
route. Invariably, several of the new enthusiasts who were elected as
delegates decided they couldn't sacrifice an entire work week to attend
convention and dropped out. A.C. was always there to pick up the slack and
do the necessary work of representing North Carolina.
I don't know if it still exists, but A.C. Linnerud was the very first
inductee into the North Carolina Road Runners Hall of Fame on Sept. 10,
1988. This was established by the RRCA and I think it is significant that
this organization chose to honor A.C. as its first inductee rather than a
star athlete. A.C. was truly the backbone of road racing in North Carolina
over the last two decades of the 20th century. He is more responsible that
any other person for accurate road racing courses and accurate timing
becoming a standard. It is out of his work that organizations such as Jim
Youngs' have sprung. We all owe A.C. a huge debt for the success of our
sport.
Over time, A.C. gradually lost his mobility, but he never lost his spirit.
He accepted gracefully the indignities of aging, kept on with his
contributions to the sport in whatever way he could, and never complained
about getting older like most of us do. He was invariably cheerful and
upbeat. In recent years he would call me in advance of a NCUSATF meeting
to make sure I would meet him outside the Law School Building at NCCU and
get him up the elevator to the second floor meeting room. He didn't want
to be late and always wanted to participate. At our meeting last Sunday
A.C. was not present and I had meant to ask about him because he almost
never misses. But one hurried conversation lead to another and I forgot to
check. Now I find that he is gone and I didn't get to say goodbye. So
farewell Ardell Chester Linnerud. An era has passed in North Carolina.
Your shoes cannot be filled
From Danny White:
It is truly a tribute to AC to hear all these fine stories and memories of our running times. Of all the people that have helped me through the years, AC probably taught me the most, mostly about measuring but also about patience! As a young up and coming runner/race manager in the early eighties AC was my "go to" man for most technical issues. We had great fun doing those 1am measurements in the city of Charlotte and although it seemed to take forever, we always completed the work. He was especially kind to me since I was still wet behind the ears, he was one of the few people that actually would help me. I just hope that one day I can be so giving as this man was. Farewell to a special person!!!