Members of the Native Thunder Distance Runners. Group founder Anita Fineday
stands in the back row, third from the right.
Running with Teri Dwyer
Reclaiming a tradition:
The Native Thunder Distance Runners
Anita Fineday, a 51-year-old lawyer, didn't grow up playing organized sports. But her lack of athletic background didn't dissuade her from setting her sights on completing the Twin Cities Marathon in 2001. 
| Red Lake Nation Chairman Buck Jourdain finishes the 2005 Twin Cities Marathon with the Red Lake Eagle staff in hand. |
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"I have no background as a runner. I went and watched it (the marathon) one year and decided that I wanted to do that," Fineday recalled. "And so I set about training the next year all by myself."Fineday is a member of the White Earth Band of Ojibwe. As the chief judge for the tribal courts of the White Earth and the Leech Lake bands of northern Minnesota, she is, of course, very busy. But she made running the TCM a goal and did so. Having enjoyed the experience, she started telling other band members about it.
"They would say, 'Oh, I've always wanted to do that.' And so I just encouraged some people to join me in training" for
the 2002 TCM, Fineday said. Together they developed what Fineday described as a very easy training program with a collective goal of simply finishing the race. And that was the beginning of the Native Thunder Distance Runners, a group of American Indian athletes who run races and train together focusing on TCM as their main event. All eight Native Thunder members who trained for the 2002 TCM finished the race.
The group has continued to train and run races together. In 2005, 21 Native Thunder members finished TCM. Fineday said 30 members might register for this year's TCM set for October 1. "Even though 30 is not very many people – it is a small group of people – we think getting 30 Indian people to finish a marathon is quite an accomplishment," Fineday said.
There's a twofold reason for Fineday's interest in starting this group, she said. One is to reclaim the heritage of American Indians as runners.
"Running is an Indian tradition. Back before non-Indian settlers came to Minnesota, there were runners in every community. The runners (held) a highly esteemed position," Fineday said. "They carried messages from village to village. And you see this all throughout the United States. The Hopi and the Navajo
reservations have held on more strongly to that tradition. They still have traditional runners. That is one of the things, as a group, that we wanted to reclaim."
Running by American Indians has had more than a utilitarian component. Throughout history, American Indians have been some of the most accomplished competitive distance runners on the national and international scene.
In 1907, Tom Longboat beat out 125 other entrants to win the Boston Marathon in what was then a record
time of 2:24:24. He smashed the old record by five and a half minutes. Jim Thorpe won gold medals in two events, the pentathlon and the decathlon, at the 1912 Olympic games in Stockholm. Louis Tewanima finished second in the 5,000 and 10,000 at those same games. Ellison "Tarzan" Brown won the Boston Marathon in 1936 and 1939. And Billy Mills won the 10,000 meter gold medal at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo. To this day, he is the only American to win that event at the Olympics.
The second goal of the Native Thunder Distance Runners, according to Fineday, is to address the overwhelming health issues in the American Indian community.
"Indian people have, statistically, the shortest life expectancy of any group in the United States. We have the highest rates of diabetes and hypertension," Fineday said. "Running and exercise is a way to combat this."
TCM offers the group a great way to keep itself on track. Each year, the night before TCM, the Native
Thunder Distance Runners have a feast at the Indian Center on Franklin Avenue in south Minneapolis. Last year the feast drew 75 runners, family members and other supporters. For many of the nervous runners, the highlight of the feast last year was the guest speaker.
"Last year we had Brandon Leslie come and speak to us. He was from New Mexico and he was running TCM," Fineday said. "He was running TCM to qualify for the Olympic Trials. He was very inspirational for
everybody. We were all in awe of him. He ended up coming in sixth overall, so we were really amazed by him."
Leslie missed qualifying for the 2008 Olympic Trials at TCM, but he still has opportunities to do so. He has since qualified to run the 10,000-meter event at the 2008 Olympic Trials. He was a member of the U.S. 12K team at the International Cross-Country Championships in Japan this past winter.
Equally inspirational was a member of Native Thunder who ran TCM last year. Floyd "Buck" Jourdain, tribal chairman of the Red Lake Nation, ran with some Red Lake youths. "Buck ran the whole marathon last year carrying the Red Lake Eagle staff," Fineday said.
With the staff and his entourage, Jourdain ran the marathon an hour slower than the year before. "So I don't know if he's going to do that again. But he was, I think, quite an inspiration for a lot of people," Fineday said.
There are currently more than 40 Native Thunder runners, most of them adults, from several tribes. Fineday and other members hope to get more youths involved in the coming years.
Fineday has other goals for the group. She'd like to see them get a bit more organized.
Establishing nonprofit status and having someone serve as an administrator would improve the group's ability to raise funds. After all, to get more youths involved, money is needed for running shoes, proper
attire, race entries and event lodging.
Perhaps, Fineday said, the group can provide young American Indians opportunities she didn't have growing up.
Teri Dwyer, based in St. Paul, Minnesota, has been a runner for over 20 years and a writer for longer than she can remember.
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