THE BIG 3-0

Neither bad back, nor broken arm, nor a son’s first communion could stop them from delivering race times at the Lilac Bloomsday Run.

When these 124 men and women shoehorn themselves near the front of the pack on Sunday morning, it will be the 30th straight Bloomsday for all. They are called perennials, which is Bloomsday lingo for people who have participated in every race since the first in 1977.

Two members are brothers, Bob Barbero of the Spokane Valley, now 54, and Rick Barbero, 52, of Eugene, Ore. They use race weekend as a reunion and a chance to renew their on-track betting.

Another is 41-year-old Northsider Dan Gillespie, the youngest member of the club. He participated in the first Bloomsday when he was 12.

Ginny Warden, a South Hill resident, was 56 at the first Bloomsday. At 86, she is now the oldest perennial. One morning last week, Warden and another longtime Bloomsday participant walked the hilly course, which has been slightly altered this year so the finish line is closer to the Monroe Street Bridge. It took them more than two hours.

In April, a group of perennials ran the original course, beginning at the Spokane Opera House and finishing in Riverfront Park. On Saturday, all the perennials are invited to a luncheon, which will be their second reunion since the 25th anniversary.

Admittedly, Warden hasn’t walked much this year. Her husband, Clifford Warden, died in March. She’s also spent a lot of time out of town, helping her daughter recover from a bad bicycle accident.

“This will be my last one,” said Warden, who also is slowed by an aching back. “I think if this hadn’t been the 30th, I might not have done this one,”

Warden will be joined by family members for her milestone walk – 14 people who will come from Texas, New Mexico and California. She said her 24-year-old granddaughter, Claire Berger from Austin, is recuperating from a broken foot and plans to complete the course in a wheelchair. Coincidentally, when Berger was 2, she also was on wheels – in a stroller being pushed along the course by her mom.

Warden remembers first hearing about Bloomsday when her husband brought home an application. She was a runner back in the mid-‘70s, and is believed to be one of two women older than 50 to compete in the first Bloomsday.

During the earliest years, fewer than 35 percent of the participants were women, compared to today’s number of nearly 60 percent.

Her streak, she said, was threatened but never interrupted. One year, she ran with a cast on her arm, the result of a ski accident. Just a few years ago, she tripped on a curb near the convent of the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary and fell at the foot of a nun.

“I said to myself, ‘I can’t stop. I still have a few miles to go,’” she recounted. “I didn’t know how I looked. I had blood all over me, but I finished.”

Rick Barbero, owner of an engine repair shop in Eugene, Ore., said he plans to finish every Bloomsday “until I’m in the grave.”

While many perennials didn’t associate to or attach the word streak to their accomplishment until after about 10 years, Rick Barbero said “from the first Bloomsday, I’ve always known where I’m going to be every first Sunday in May.”

His commitment caused him to miss his son’s first communion, but Rick Barbero playfully rationalized that his son, now 24, “Doesn’t go to church today.”

Both Bob and Rick Barbero were competitive runners at West Valley High School, Spokane Falls Community College and Eastern Washington University. Bob Barbero, a math teacher, coached track and cross country at University High for 24 years and currently is the girls assistant coach at Mt. Spokane High. He remembers his brother called him to tell him about the first Bloomsday.

“It was huge,” said Bob Barbero, who was living in Davenport in 1977. “I had not seen that many runners in one place before.”

Over the years, whether the two run together, separately or with others, there’s always their brotherly race within the race. Bob Barbero holds the edge, 16-12-1. However, Rick has another streak going, winning the last nine times.

“The loser buys dinner,” said Bob Barbero, who was coming off back surgery last Bloomsday and finished in 1 hour, 3 minutes, 35 seconds to his brother’s 51:10 time. “I still owe him a bunch.”

The younger Barbero’s time was second fastest among the perennials, only to be topped by the man with the youngest legs – Gillespie, who finished in 49:03.

Gillespie was a sixth-grader at Mead Middle School when he ran his first Bloomsday. He did it with his now-deceased father, Jack Gillespie, and his two school pals, who have since moved to Pasadena, Calif.

“I remember the first one, it was really hot and I walked some of it,” said Gillespie, who majored in history in college and drives a UPS truck.

Still serious about exercising, Gillespie said he runs about 30 miles and bicycles about 100 miles a week. He suffered a running-related injury in the mid-‘90s, but nothing serious enough to keep him away from Bloomsday.

“Bloomsday is a really good race,” he said. “They haven’t messed it up. It’s still a challenging course. And well organized.”

He said if there was ever a time to break his string, it would have during the two years when he lived in Bozeman and attended Montana State University. But he came home.

“If I was out of town, I’d make a special effort to get back. If I was injured, I’d do it on crutches,” Gillespie said. “Whatever it took to keep the streak alive.”