Annual Bentleyville event keeping memory of runner alive
Observer-Reporter
Jaminique Milliren, left, and Cathy Loos didn’t run until the family started the Run For Alex, which honors former Bentworth track standout Alexzandra Loos.
Alex Loos
Observer-Reporter
Participants gather at the starting line for the five-mile race at the 12th annual Run For Alex in Bentleyville.
Jaminique Milliren was never much of a runner growing up.
After her sister, Alexzandra Loos, was struck by a car and killed while walking home from an Aug. 11, 2004, Bentworth High School soccer practice, she said that all changed.
For the past 15 years, Milliren and her father, Jim Loos, both of Eighty Four, have helped bring thousands of people from across Western Pennsylvania together to take part in the Sarris Candies Run for Alex in Bentleyville.
“We’ve become runners like she was,” Milliren said. “The only regret is we didn’t do more to get involved when she was here with us to run with her. It was something new to me. I always wanted to run. I felt that I had a purpose now. Every year, I felt I needed to come.”
The 15th annual Run for Alex is set to be held June 1 with the first race of the day beginning at 9 a.m. outside the Bentleyville Social Hall.
“I’ve been doing runs ever since Alex died,” Jim Loos said. “I can’t ask people to do a run if I don’t know what one is. Our whole family is out there.”
Runners can register for either for a one-, two- or five-mile race, along with a one-mile fun walk.
“We consider this race pretty much a starter for people,” Loos said. “People will go there and walk and think, ‘Oh, I can do that two-mile.'”
In addition to the races, food and family-oriented activities will be available inside the social hall and in its parking lot.
“It brings the whole community together,” Loos said. “People just really come out and support us and help.”
“We made a promise to Alex we would keep her memory alive,” he added. “We try to do that.”
Alex Loos, then a 15-year-old Bentworth sophomore, was walking along Lincoln Avenue in Bentleyville on a sunny summer day when she was struck by a vehicle traveling more than 70 mph in a posted 40-mph speed limit zone. The driver of the vehicle had 17 prior convictions of driving on a suspended license.
Alex was flown to UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, where Jim, along with his wife, Cathy, sat by her bedside for 36 hours before she died from head, neck and torso injuries.
She was less than two weeks shy of her 16th birthday when she died.
“Alex was a kind and compassionate person,” Loos said.
And, his daughter was also an accomplished athlete.
Alex Loos completed a standout freshman track season just prior to her death. She won a WPIAL championship in the 1,600-meter run in record time and went on to place third in the 1,600 and fifth in the 800-meter run at the PIAA Championship meet.
A large part of the Run for Alex festivities is to remind those in attendance about all Alex achieved during a life cut short by tragedy, Loos said.
“People who didn’t know her, we have everything she’s done,” he said of his daughter. “She was known pretty much for her athletics, but anyone who knew her personally knew just how compassionate she was.”
Aside from remembering Alex, another goal of the race festivities is to give the Loos family an opportunity to give back to their community.
The From Alex With Love Foundation, which was started by the Loos family and helps plan the race each year, has awarded more than 225 scholarships and 2,000 books to Washington County second-grade students. The foundation has also donated computers, iPads, smart TVs and laptops to classrooms throughout the county, Loos said.
“Throughout the whole area, we usually donate all the stuff to the high school, middle school and elementary schools to promote awareness,” he said.
With the race in its 15th year, Loos said he is proud of what his foundation has achieved.
“We just figured a way we can continue her memory is to give in her name,” he said. “We’ve managed to keep her spirit alive for 15 years and we are kind of hoping as long as we are able to do it that we can keep this up.”
And Loos and his family have no intentions of stopping the race anytime soon.
“It’s actually been good because it’s still growing,” he said. “In Washington County, it’s one of the biggest races they do throughout the year.”
The Race for Alex is expected to include more than 1,000 runners this year and is put on by 200 volunteers, Loos said.
Washington County’s Emergency Management Agency shuts down five miles of roads in Bentleyville to assure the safety of all runners and walkers involved in the day’s festivities.
“We try to keep this where this can be family-oriented,” Loos said.
Seeing how much the Race for Alex has grown over the years has been very special for the Loos family.
“It’s kind of crazy where we’ve come from,” Milliren said of the race. “Honestly, the first race I’ve ever run myself was our race.
“I feel like she still inspires people even though she’s not here,” Milliren added of her sister. “People say they’ve never run a race and they do it for Alex.”
Although she didn’t start out life as an avid runner, in the 15 years since her sister’s death, Milliren has seen the sport become a part of her life – much like the community that has formed around the Bentleyville event.
“Each year it’s kind of transformed where we’ve seen her closest friends and people who knew her and didn’t know of her real well and now people still recognize her,” Milliren said. “We just hope each year we can keep doing this and it just reminds people what kind of person she was.”
“It’s become part of my life now,” she added. “Each year, I run in a ‘In Memory of Alex’ shirt.”
The cost to run in the five-mile race is $20, while the two-mile race costs $18 and the one-mile event is $12. The kids one-mile fun walk costs $10. To register for the event, visit www.fromalexwithlove.com.
“We really just want people to kind of get a feel for what kind of person she was,” Milliren said. “We really hope that people take that away and use it as motivation for their lives.”