by Virginia Brophy Achman

Road races play an important role for professional athletes.  Many professional athletes earn a living, in part, by winning prize money at such events.

Each year, various road races are awarded championship races by USATF, meaning the national championship for that distance will be held in conjunction with their road race (e.g. 2013 USA Men’s Marathon Championship at the 2013 Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon). The collective championship races in a given year form the USA Running Circuit.  Competing in national championship events allows an athlete the opportunity to win points based on their placement in the event. The athlete who collects the most points wins prize money for the circuit provided by USATF.

Twin Cities In Motion (TCM) supports the development of post-collegiate athletes at a local and national level.  Twin Cities In Motion is a non-profit corporation that organizes and directs the annual Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon and related events, and numerous races year round, as a community service for the Minneapolis-Saint Paul Area.

TCM has a long history of hosting national championships for professional athletes including the marathon, ten-mile and one-mile road championships.  TCM also supports professional athletes by directly sponsoring training centers like Team USA Minnesota and the Distance Project operated by the USATF Foundation.

Another supporter of post collegiate athletes is Running USA (RUSA).  Running USA provides a grant each year to a training center.  TCM is a member of RUSA and a strong advocate and financial contributor to the grant program.

TCM also supports USATF’s Athlete Development Program (ADP), which identifies post-collegiate athletes and assists with their continued development by providing them with travel stipends, transportation and waived entry fees to select championships throughout the year.

Virginia Brophy Achman
Virginia Brophy Achman is the executive director of Twin Cities In Motion.