Local trail running group highlights natural amenities of West County area

 (This ran April 24 in West Newsmagazine online and print. All photos are by Elaine Collins.)

Participants in the Ozark Foothills Endurance Run, held at Greensfelder Park in Wildwood

Shalini Bhajjan is blending passion, experience and skill into a unique local direction. The Delhi, India, native moved to the U.S. in the 1990’s and pursued a professional career in design and merchandising. After working in that field for more than a decade in New York, then two years in Florida, Bhajjan settled into the Ballwin area.  

Since then, Bhajjan’s path took an interesting turn. After being a stay-at-home mom to three children for a handful of years, Bhajjan started running, and has kept on running.

But unlike Forrest Gump’s adventures along America’s roads, Bhajjan casually ran the trails of nearby Castlewood State Park around 2011-2012. Shortly thereafter, she connected with a group in Wisconsin and ran her first 50k ultra trail run.

“Getting back to St. Louis, I was just looking for people to run with,” Bhajjan said. “I was throwing out weekly runs, and a bunch of us would connect and do long Sunday runs at Greensfelder County Park and elsewhere. That kind of initiated a question, ‘Why aren’t there any races here?’ It snowballed from there.”

                                                      Race Director Shalini Bhajjan and speaker Traci Falbo.

Bhajjan connected with United States of America Track & Field (USATF). That led to the creation of Terrain Trail Runners-STL which combines her talents of not only coordinating runs and races, and helping work on actual trails plus merchandising products for the organization and specific races. From there, she directed the Ozark Foothills event.

Bhajjan has been race directing full-time for 10 years and currently has 11 events in St. Louis. Ten of those events offer races ranging from 5k up to 100 miles, and are held at different state and county parks. Every race showcases different terrain and different kinds of trail systems.

“The eleventh event is actually a women’s summit, a free community event I host in October,” Bhajjan said. “It’s open to all female athletes, whether they’re running, hiking, cycling or just want to learn more about the outdoors and connect with other women in the area. I started that with the goal to engage women in the outdoors and create that safe place for other female athletes.”

Terrain Trail Runners-STL has brought new races to Greensfelder, Rockwood Reservations and Al Foster, to name a few local parks. She also has a first-ever foot race this year at Babler State Park on May 4. It’s a 15k run known as Babler Bongo.

“I run in a lot of races in the United States and internationally,” Bhajjan said. “I always get the question of where I’m from. Everyone has the misconception that St. Louis is all just Katy Trail – like crushed flat gravel. I wanted to prove that’s false. Our trails are not all flat because we are at the Ozark foothills. We don’t have 2,000 and 3,000 feet climbs, but our trails are equally challenging.  Also, I take pride in the accessibility of all our trails, and don’t want people to keep saying that just because we live in St. Louis, we won’t be able to run some of the out-of-town trails. My top priority has been showcasing what we have and creating routes and events that bring in people.”

To maintain sustainability, Bhajjan also limits race participant numbers to 100-125. Ozark Hills is one of the biggest races, pulling in 200-250 runners. Bhajjan said some 40% of the participants traveled here from outside the Greater St. Louis and Metro East area for their recent April 5-7 Ozark Foothills Terrain Trails runs. She added, “That’s an introduction into, ‘Hey! This is happening in St. Louis!’”

“Outside of that, I’m heavily involved in a lot of trail building and volunteer events,” Bhajan said. “One of the initiatives we have in place is with Forest ReLeaf. Sustainability is a component in a lot of what I do in race directing. It’s not just throwing out races. It’s a lot of mindfulness of giving back to the community and showcasing what St. Louis has in our trail systems.”

The Forest ReLeaf initiative has helped plant 44 trees at Route 66 State Park.

Event registrations for Terrain Trail Runners-STL runs offer a question where participants can opt out for shirts and other items. As Bhajjan notes, if you run in several events, getting such merchandise is a redundant thing. So, runners can choose to plant a tree instead of getting additional apparel.

“What will happen this year, unless I can find an initiative of planting a certain number of trees at Greensfelder County Park or wherever, I will look at how many people opted out of the t-shirt for all of my races, and basically take all that money and donate to Forest ReLeaf,” Bhajjan said.

Regarding trail work and maintenance, Bhajjan partners with St. Louis County Parks and state parks with volunteer projects to help maintain trails.  She also works closely with Gateway Off-Road Cyclists (GORC), a non-profit that also helps maintain area trails.

“It’s not just offering a lot of events, but also giving back,” Bhajjan said. “For the event I have in February, I donate all the funds to GORC for all they do. After all, trails don’t maintain themselves, and a lot of the parks departments are understaffed. So, I’m side-by-side helping them clean the trails and do whatever is needed.”

Terrain Trail Runners-STL is a free group, and anyone can join. It’s very active on Facebook where the group started and where all group runs are posted. The only payment is for specific race registration.

Spring truly sprung with hope at the Job Seekers’ Garden Club meeting

 

The March 27^th Job Seekers’ Garden Club (JSGC) event was a veritable Garden of Eden for those seeking both knowledge and connections regarding the path to satisfying employment opportunities.

The Center for Specialized Services at 11828 Lackland Road was the site for the six-hour ‘Matching Passion to Purpose’ extravaganza, co-hosted by Rockit Careers.

It was fitting that the first person introduced to the nearly packed house was JSGC Founder and Executive Director Bob Kolf. His contributions to the area can never be overstated.  Since planting a seed in March 2020, the then networking group gradually germinated into a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization that has sprouted to well over 5,000 members!

Kolf was followed by several Board members like group Vice-President Lexie Dendrinelis, who also served as event emcee; Brian Young and Mitch Mandel, Career Coaches at Rockit Careers; Secretary Kay Kalra and Treasurer Edwin Schmid. Next introduced were about 10 JSGC ambassadors.

Meanwhile, Sarah Snyder of SC Consultings, LLC provided fantastic event photography while Wendy Fitter, who started Unleashed Music & Event Planning some 20 years ago, did likewise with terrific music during lunch and the half dozen breaks.

It was Dendrinelis’ honor to introduce keynote speaker Tri Pham, a fellow Dale Carnegie of Missouri member. His multi-step Translating Your Life's Purpose to a Job presentation was accompanied by a wide variety of brief networking sessions from one-on-ones to small group gatherings and even entire room activities.

Pham’s first of several slides was ‘Today, we will: 1)Draft a compelling vision that motivates. 2)Use the “Start with WHY” framework to communicate our vision. 3)Leverage the conversation linking method to build a lasting impression.’ After all, Pham showed a slide with a Helen Keller quote: “The only thing worse than being blind is having sight, but no vision.”

Pham also offered one of his own lines: “Things can change very quickly. Don’t give up!” That was in reference to losing his job in 2020 and heading back to Nebraska before being offered a job at Dale Carnegie in St. Louis just three months later.  He’s currently a Certified Senior Trainer. Pham used projection into the future as a means of one’s vision, stating ‘I AM’ in several cases, which included specific job position and its job environment.

Then came the question, ‘What is a trait of a successful person?’ Regarding importance on the job, the near capacity crowd touched on roughly a dozen responses.  But Pham had it narrowed down to three main categories: 1)Skills, 2)Knowledge, and 3)Attitude.  While knowledge stood at just 15%, the other two combined for a hefty 85%!

“That slide with the surprising importance of those numbers really caught my eye!” said Sally Matiszik. “That’s reassuring as a job seeker; especially my pivot from being a restaurant owner for seven years to a return to B2B sales. I had asked myself, ‘If I were not doing this job right here, right now, would it still be what I wanted to do today?’ That great question got me back into job seeking. The name of this group reminds me of a garden spreading out to keep growing.”

For the process of networking throughout the room, Pham offered Conversation Links starting with one’s name, where they live and their family. Next was work, travel, hobbies and greatest life’s passions. He added that “We need to communicate and expand our comfort zone by using emotional intelligence in our conversations.”

Even so, Pham added a Dale Carnegie quote into the mix regarding attitude: “It isn’t what you have, who you are, where you are or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about.”

“His presentation was a good overview of most aspects of job seeking,” said JSGC  Ambassador Joshua Maloney. “The exercises were great because I’m in sales vs. people who may not be as comfortable speaking to so many others.  This was a good road map because positivity breeds success.”

Maloney found his current position as Director of Sales and Growth with Guardex Home Maintenance and Repair through Job Seekers. “I became a group ambassador to be an example for other people. The group is so inviting and welcoming! It felt right to keep being with people who understand how frustrating the job search can be.”

One intermission featured a brief, but heartfelt presentation by Janet R. Martin. Having suffered a fairly recent job layoff, Martin first filled the room with a bone-chilling rendition of “I’m a Song,” written by a friend of Lonestar bass guitar player Robby Wilson. Martin herself currently writes and performs faith-based music after helping a good number of veterans and others at work. This will be her fourth year of participating in the National Veterans Creative Arts Festival, held May 16 in Denver.

If that wasn’t super-charged enough, Janet revealed how she had been horribly abused in  marriage. She proceeded to read parts of her emotionally-charged chapter entitled ‘God’s Grace’ in the book, Breaking the Silence.

“I had developed very negative health myself, but because of networking, I wrote the anthology through healing instead of throwing people under the bus unlike what others do. If we don’t connect, we miss out on so many opportunities.”

Frank Alaniz, Workforce Consultant in AI, presented The Power of AI in a Purpose-Driven Job Search. That started with a slide, “AI will not replace you. A person who is using AI will.”

He revealed several surprising facts about current job seekers: 1)Only 51% have relevant keywords. 2)Less than 25% customize their resumes to fit each available job. 3)A full 35% have zero metrics. 4)Only 48% of resumes contain a LinkedIn URL. 5)A full 51% of resumes contain unneeded buzzwords, cliches or misspelled words.

Alaniz then displayed a series of slides and provided detailed explanations of subtopics like the Pros and Cons of AI, necessary cover letter prompts, important LinkedIn headlines for job seekers, resume steps and potential interview questions. He also added important details of following up on job applications using the 7-7-21 method.

“If you understand the process, you can be successful in the process,” he said.

Alaniz added that despite all the crucial AI steps, “Networking will always be the best way to get a job.”

While emphasizing so many do’s and don’ts of various AI sites and formats, Alaniz continually noted the importance of reaching out to Young and Mandel for resume writing tips.

After another networking break, Young spoke on Communicating Your Purpose Through Your Cover Letter and Resume.

Young emphasized the need to study all details of the job description, starting with the purpose of the job, its importance to the company, and what skills and personal qualities would be necessary to fulfill that job’s needs.

Once that’s done, there’s a choice among chronological, functional and hybrid resumes with individual details to include or exclude based on age, years of experience, employment gaps, skills, and possible career change.  Next are graphic design choices and how resume items should be formatted for easiest readability.

For the actual writing of the resume, steps presented were the Professional Summary starting with a catchy opening statement, followed by hard and soft skills, experience with specific accomplishments that are quantified, if possible. The next segment would include education followed by training and perhaps certifications or licenses, then pertinent memberships, volunteering and personal accomplishments; especially for those without a great deal of actual work experience.

“This is basically Resume 101 in a nutshell,” Young said. “What’s important is readability.  So, don’t cram a lot of stuff on one page with really small font. You can go to two pages, but always aim to go more than halfway down that second page.”

Finally, Young said to tell your story in your cover letter; again, starting with a catchy lead and wording that appeals to emotions, shows your uniqueness and has a hook that makes readers want to learn more. The cover letter also needs to be personal to the job and company itself, noting the value you would add to that company without being too lengthy.

“Unfortunately, a lot of hiring managers and HR people don’t even look at cover letters. So, sometimes it’s also good to mail in a copy with your resume.”

In the process, Young added that it may be to a job seeker’s benefit to talk to some of their own connections for advice; especially if seeking employment outside their own regular line of work. That said, Young and Mandel can also be contacted to ensure resumes. Like their Rockit Careers namesake, they can take the fortunes of prospective employees up to the stars!

“I was so excited to see the list of speakers; especially having one from Dale Carnegie,” Matiszik added.  “I was just blown away with the presentations! And it was so affordable with a charge of just $10 that included a great catered lunch! If it wasn’t the Job Seekers Garden Club where he spoke, it would have been so expensive!”

Added to that, experienced leadership trainer Eva Henry announced she’s offering 12 free workshops in person and virtual: “Networking can be difficult. It was for me.  But everybody in this room is fighting for what’s best for you!”

Other recruiters at the event included Jeanna Smith of Challenge Unlimited; Leah Harris of Unleashing Potential; Jeff Strasburg of MERS/Goodwill; Alicia Goetten of New York Life Insurance Company; David Halfmann of Executive Financial Group; Ragan Andrew of Adrift Tours & Travel; Mandy Kendall of Northwestern Mutual; Cheryl/Cheri Zink of Zink Enterprises, LLC; and Kenda Curativo, who helped provide the event’s home base as Director of Career Development and Work Incentive Practitioner at the Center for Specialized Services.

Meanwhile, Dendrinelis, who has spent her entire career in corporate wellness, recalled giving a presentation in a different networking group years ago when she was approached by Kolf. “He asked if I would give a presentation at one of his events. Shortly thereafter, I joined his Executive Board. Today’s meeting was fabulous! It’s exactly what I expected!”

Dendrinelis offered a quote from 130 years ago by famous American inventor and businessman Thomas Alva Edison. It was intended for dozens of job seekers in attendance, and still rings true: “Our greatest weakness is giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”