In 1999, several years after a successful high school track career, Rick Meyers (now the owner of The Runner’s Sole in Chambersburg, PA) awoke to the realities of middle age. Like so many of us he’d let himself go – he smoked, ate junk food, swilled beer and lazed about on the couch. The night his oldest daughter, a fifth grader, began playing sports Rick stood her in front of the gym and delivered a lecture on the rules of basketball and good health, all while a cigarette dangled from the corner of his mouth. His innocent daughter looked up at him with her big brown eyes, unconsciously staring at the cigarette and said, “Alright daddy, I’ll do my best!”

“Good,” Rick thought, and stamped out his smoke, ushering her inside the gym and over to her team. As he sat enjoying the game a horrific feeling crept into his heart. The image of his healthy daughter staring at his cigarette played in his mind, he’d just coached his little girl about good health and being physically fit all while puffing away on a cancer stick. It hit him like a bag of bricks. He was shocked by his own hypocrisy. In the middle of the game he sneaked away to the bathroom and flushed the cigarettes down the toilet. While the janitor was none too pleased his lungs sure were. On the way home, his daughter chatted excitedly about her game, no clue that her father was not smoking his customary cigarette. The next day, Meyers bought a cheap pair of running shoes, shorts and a treadmill. Though he couldn’t run for more than five minutes it didn’t matter. He knew he was saving his and his kid’s lives.

Flash forward to 2008, Meyers now has a bad case of running addiction, putting in over a hundred miles a week, running so hard he gets lost, chased by foxes and skunks at night, doing marathons and ultra-marathons and even qualifying for Boston. During all the long lonely miles he was pounding away a dream had formed

in his mind, to make a living at running. He knew he couldn’t be an elite runner nor did he possess any credentials to coach. But one day he ordered a new pair of shoes from the box sporting goods store, the only game in town. With their moronic staff of know-nothings, of course the shoes didn’t fit so back they went. The replacements came and they didn’t fit and neither did the third pair. While waiting for the fourth pair to arrive Meyers and his family went on vacation. Browsing in a small running store he stopped and chatted with the owner and before he left, he knew what he was going to do.

In August of 2008, Rick Meyers opened The Runner’s Sole in Chambersburg, PA. It’s his first business venture and when he started he didn’t know much about shoes, fittings, or the industry. Due to finances his location isn’t ideal, flanked by a check cashing place on one side and a Kentucky Fried Chicken about ten feet away. It’s comical to watch the hard core runners mingle with the down-and-out fast food eaters. He used credit cards, his oldest daughter’s part-time job savings and the family’s swimming pool money to buy the store. Despite the economy,  the location and his lack of experience, things have gone better then expected and he loves his job. It’s going to take awhile to convince his wife it was a good idea and to pay back those credit card companies and his daughter but he couldn’t imagine doing anything else.

The Runner’s Sole is the first specialty running store in the area. Meyers’ learning curve has been steep and what he lacks in experience he makes up for in attention and time and proper fitting of shoes and apparel. The local running community comprises just a small percentage of the population but as with most running communities, they are a tightly connected group of people. Meyers seeks out runners from the surrounding communities to keep interests alive and blossoming. It helps to make new running friends and find new people to inspire to run.

When Meyers saw the first 20 seconds of the trailer for The Long Green Line he was hooked, he’s a big softee for sports movies and after a tear formed in his eye he had to have it for his store. There are plans in the works for an in-store screening sometime in the future but then again, Meyers has big plans all around, for his store and growing the running community in Chambersburg. Why not, if he can transform himself from couch potato to heath nut then why can’t his town?