“Come on out and have a beer!” Cypress & Grove Brewery owner Patrick Burger said.
Roughly 60 people stood outside the brewery in 46-degree weather and 20-mile-per-hour winds, watching as beer was being poured into clear, plastic cups.
Gainesville’s first beer mile kicked off Saturday in support of the Gainesville Area Rowing club (GAR), a non-profit Florida corporation created to promote rowing as a sport in the Alachua County area.
The club is composed of about 40 students in its high school program, about 20 on the middle school team and about 25 in the Master’s program for adults.
Beer, running and a rowing club — not the most traditional mix of things, but those ideas came together to build the inaugural event.
Saturday’s beer mile was held at Cypress & Grove Brewery, a company that promotes drinking “from a well.” Patrick Burger, the owner of the nearly eight-year-old product, said he came up with the idea in the comfort of his own home.
“I was a home brewer,” Burger said. “I liked making my own beer, and it was one of those things I really enjoyed doing, and all my friends really enjoyed drinking it. Every home brewer’s dream is to go big, right?”
The event encouraged participants to either walk or run a mile on the surrounding paved trail next to the brewery. The race was split into four sections, with runners (or walkers) gulping down a beer, real or non-alcoholic, after each quarter of a mile.
“Whoever wins, wins,” Burger said. “Nobody is really counting on who’s winning, I think they’re just trying to survive.”
Yes, everyone survived. But one runner did more than just that. Adam Truesdale finished the race with a time of 5:44.
“I did not expect something that fast,” Truesdale said.
The physical therapist with HCA West Marion’s inpatient rehab facility in Ocala said he was impressed with his impeccable time, but had logic behind his success.
“There are two things going on for me,” Truesdale said. “I am an above-average beer drinker, not the best. And I am an above-average runner, not the best. But I’m a better beer drinker than most runners. I’m a better runner than most beer drinkers. So that’s why I’m finding the happy medium of this.”
Truesdale, like the others who came out to show their support of GAR, wanted to help in any way he could. If it meant running a sub-6-minute mile, he was all for it.
“I’m a physical therapist, so I’m all about using your body and doing fun stuff and doing what you like to do,” he said. “I absolutely want to support the growing community in Gainesville to help them be able to do more events for themselves.”
While the beer mile required a minimum age of 21, that did not stop children of all ages from showing their support. The event also had a “vintage award” for the fastest finisher over 70 years old.
“If you look around, it’s not just the actual club members that are here representing the club,” Truesdale said. “They’re not doing the event, per se, but there’s little siblings, there’s parents, and so I think that’s probably the more important piece of it, is that it’s bringing people together to do something kind of silly but kind of fun.”
The Gainesville Area Rowing club is focused on teaching young adults physical fitness, nutrition, psychological skills and more. However, that is only possible with the proper equipment.
Rowing is an incredibly expensive sport, especially for a program that strives to teach nearly 100 children and adults. GAR board member Caroline Parker has overseen the public relations and social media aspect of the program for three years. She said various facets of the club would benefit from the beer mile’s assistance.
“Oars cost as much as a couple grand apiece,” Parker said. “Boats cost about $70,000. Where it’s located out at Newnans Lake, we need a well dug, and it's going to be about $35,000, so we have clean drinking water for the kids, but also clean water to clean the boats, to flush the toilets, to do those sorts of things.”
Among the 20 kids on GAR’s middle school team is 13-year-old Liam Clemens. The Oak View Middle School student was in charge of the “beat the rower” activity after all the runners had completed the beer mile. He competed against various participants on a rowing machine to see who could row 100 meters fastest.
Clemens said he is having fun with GAR because of the friendly collaboration.
“I am very much enjoying it because the people are nice and we get along very well,” he said. “Teamwork is basically the main thing. So what makes rowing fun is once you get to know people, you enjoy it more and that’s basically what rowing is all about.”
Contact Riley Orovitz at rorovitz@alligator.org. Follow her on X @rileyorovitz.
Riley is a sophomore sports journalism student in her second semester at The Alligator. She is the beat reporter for Gators Swim & Dive while also contributing to the Gators Football Beat. She previously served in the same role in her first semester with the newspaper. Riley is an avid South Florida sports fan and enjoys playing/following all sports in her free time.
