BY SHERRY CONOHAN
Staff Writer
LITTLE SILVER — And Little Silver makes it three.
The borough became the third and final town — after Red Bank and Fair Haven — to approve a change in the date of the George Sheehan Classic road race from the second week of August to June 19, the third Saturday in June, thereby making the change of date official.
The Borough Council gave its blessing by a voice vote at its meeting Monday night, with two council members absent, after a discussion about how strongly Councilman Donald S. Galante, one of the two absentees, was opposed to allowing the change.
They recalled how Galante had objected in caucus to moving the date to June 19 because that was part of graduation weekend for Red Bank Regional High School.
But a member of the race committee told the council the graduation is scheduled for Friday, June 18. He said the runners in the five-mile race would be passing through Little Silver between 8:30 and 9:30 a.m. on Saturday and be gone. He said there would be no setup for the race on Friday, only early Saturday morning.
The council finally concluded Galante was not overly opposed and went along with the change.
The race committee was seeking to move the race to an earlier date to avoid the extreme heat of August, which has been hard on the runners, according to a committee member.
The race is named for Dr. George Sheehan, a cardiologist like his father, with an office in Red Bank, who took up running at midlife. He wrote a column about running for The Daily and Sunday Register, a now defunct newspaper in Shrewsbury and before that Red Bank, and went on to write eight books and to lecture around the world on running and listening to one’s body.
He also served as medical editor for Runner’s World magazine.
In addition to the five-mile run, the race program includes a two-mile walk and a children’s classic.
Proceeds from the race go to charity and to area athletic teams.