With the 29th annual Ogden Newspapers 20K Classic Run and Walk now in our rear view mirror, plans are already under way for the 2006 race weekend which will take place on May 26-27.

Howard Corcoran, race director met with the executive committee of the 20K Classic late last week to review the recent event and to put the focus on next year.

"Since it will be the 30th year for the race, we want to make it a special weekend,'' Corcoran said. "Special attention will be paid to the past history of the Ogden 20K Classic and we hope to bring back some of the early greats who helped make the race what it is today.''

The 2006 Ogden 20K Classic Hall of Fame, which will be in its third year of existence, is expected to include at least one more international runner, following the induction of Bill Rodgers and Patty Catalano Dillon in 2004, along with Tom Fleming last month.

Of course, another big celebration is planned for the 16 members of the Ogden Ironmen Club - runners who have started and finished in each of the previous 29 distance races.

"Those guys are a unique, strong-minded group of runners,'' Corcoran said. "All they talked about at the end of this year's race was coming back for the 30th anniversary next May.''

The race director also had good news to report from the sponsors side. "Our numbers were solid despite the inclement weather,'' said Corcoran. "I'm happy that we showed an increase in participants. The sponsors are happy and, from what I've heard, so were the runners and walkers.''

Runner and walker registrations for the events on Memorial Day weekend totaled 1,528 participants.

Here's the breakdown for the various events:

• 691 in the 20K Run
• 204 for the 20K Walk
• 350 in the 5K Run and Walk For Your Health
• 120 in the Ogden Tiny Tot Trot
• 100 for the Ogden Fun Run
• 63 in the Ogden Mile

Corcoran, who has been with the race for 28 of the previous 29 years, said the number of no-shows each year generally runs around 10 percent.

The actual number of finishers in all seven races was 1,339, including 593 runners who participated in the 20K.

"We've stopped the downslide and that's a good sign. We want to keep building on an upward trend,'' he said.

Kudos also were sent out from the race director to the hundreds of volunteers without whose efforts an event such as the Ogden Newspapers 20K Classic would not be possible.

He paid special tribute to the young people who manned the aid stations along the altered course which included parts of the Wheeling Heritage Trail. It wasn't an easy task considering the heavy rain that fell during most of the 20K.

Because the course had to be changed this year due to construction along Route 40, another challenge was presented to make sure the new layout still measured 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) in length.

One of the assistant race directors, Bob Scatterday, helped supervise the measurement of the new course and he also was in charge of the more than 350 aid station workers.

The possibility exists that the altered course might have to be used next May because work on the Wheeling Tunnels is scheduled to begin after the first of the year.

"We have already had discussions with West Virginia Department of Highways officials on the situation,'' Corcoran said. "The work on the tunnels project will result in a heavier traffic flow along Wheeling Hill. To assure the safety of the runners we probably won't be able use the old course,''

A final decision on the 2006 racing layout isn't likely to be made until early next spring.

As Corcoran has done in the past, he again extended his thanks for the help provided by the City of Wheeling, including the operations management team, and members of the police and fire departments, who assisted in traffic and crowd control.

"Despite the wet weather, our ChampionChip timing devices worked very well once again,'' Corcoran noted. "A lot of people thought we might have problems with the computer chips due to the rain. From the timing standpoint, we didn't have any glitches.''

The only disappointment for the race committee centered around the 5K Team Cup, which attracted little interest. The committee marketed the event aggressively, but it did not result in enough numbers to make it worthwhile. Fewer than 10 teams signed up for the team cup competition so it was decided not to include the Team Cup on the 2006 race package.