The original “Basin Blues Running Club” goes back to 1962. It was a group of Birmingham/Reseda/Van Nuys high school runners who went to UCLA and lived and trained in the Valley. They came up with the name because they trained in the Sepulveda Basin and were always blue because they were always injured. Those guys were really fast. If you check the UCLA track and X/C records back then, they were all over the place.

As the group aged and moved on, another group took over. The club eventually faded off in the 80’s but in the 90’s a group of the club remnants revives the club. Former President Duffy and Lynn and I pondered that and accepted the challenge, held an open meeting in a pizza place at Roscoe and Louise to get an idea of who was interested and what they wanted. About 50 people showed up. Checks were collected from everyone (dues: $25.00) to get it started. It took a year and a half to get the state of California to issue the paperwork (due to a couple of liens and some other bills against the old name we had to re-incorporate as New Basin Blues). The club revived in ’91 and got a .org designation to facilitate the 501 (C) 3 status so we could start doing good in the community.