The Motor City Striders have become the Mark Twain of running clubs. Word of their demise has proven premature.

In July, 30-year Striders President Ed Kozloff announced the club's last race would be the Dec. 4 Jingle Bell Run for Arthritis in Birmingham. Its first race was held July 11, 1959, on Belle Isle, five-miler won by Grosse Pointe's Jerry Bocci.

In November, Bocci and his wife, Jeannie, raced-walked a marathon in Rhode Island, giving them at least one marathon, run or walked, in all 50 states.

Kozloff announced Nov. 29 that the Striders have had a change of heart. The club will continue putting on races in 2005 and beyond, though on a far-reduced scale than past years.

"We're getting back to our roots, putting on small club races," Kozloff said.

He said he'd had overtures from some running-community members about taking over the Strider races, but had concerns they wanted to use the Strider name for their own economic benefit at the detriment of the club's reputation.

"We kind of viewed it as a hostile takeover," he said. "That probably motivated us to keep going, to some extent. We weren't happy with some of the stuff they were proposing."

Kozloff asked, rhetorically, if one of those making inquiries was so concerned about keeping the Striders going, why hadn't he ever joined the club though its many years?

Another impetus for continuing to host some races is a handful are especially near and dear to long-time club volunteers and board members.

This year's Turkey Trot 10K in downtown Detroit was the first since 1986 that hadn't been scored by the Striders. For the first time in nearly 20 years, Kozloff said, he and his wife, Sue, were able to enjoy a leisurely family dinner. Then they went to a big Columbus antique show, where Kozloff found running memorabilia to add to his collection, including magazines about the 1936 Olympics, old race medals and a postcard depicting a runner from 1910.

As it stands, the Striders' 2005 schedule will include five races, down from 17 in 2004 and more than 30 races through much of the 1980s and 1990s. By far the largest of them - an exception to the small-club-race philosophy - will be the June 11 Race for the Cure, a fund-raiser to fight breast cancer which has drawn more than 30,000 in recent years.

"The Cure people asked me to keep doing it," Kozloff says. "They said, 'Can't you do it one more year and train someone to replace you?'"

There are professional organizations that score races, but at $2 or so a head, the cost to the Karmanos Cancer Institute would have been substantially more than what the Striders charge, Kozloff said. The Striders don't offer age-group awards for such mega-races, but Karmanos officials didn't think advantages of age-group scoring were worth the cost..

The other 2005 Striders races include the Berkley 10K on Mother's Day, the Oak-Apple 10K in Royal Oak in June, the Falcon 5K to benefit Divine Child High School in Dearborn in August, and the Trot for Tots 5K in Royal Oak in September.

Kozloff said the club may also continue to host the Peruski Memorial 5K cross-country run in Dearborn in November. The race honors Margaret Peruski, a long-time Strider and women's running pioneer.

"Who knows, maybe we'll be re-energized to do one or two more," he says. MR