It’s been home to a driving range, disc golf and mini-golf. And, part of it has been farmed.
Dave McCormack, Gateway Disc Sports owner, won the MPO title there in 1996, part of a Pro/Am C-Tier event.
Tom Dill used to run not only the golf driving range there, but also the Little Putter mini-golf course.
But, there always will be a cross country lure to the Big Driver course in Washington.
“I truly love Big Driver as a coach,” Union cross country Head Coach Sarah (Meiners) Hurt said. “This course is a special one for me and my running journey.”
Hurt has such a high regard for the course that she decided to host the Four Rivers Conference meet there last week, despite the fact that there isn’t a league member in Washington.
Hurt has a special attachment to Big Driver, her home course while running for St. Francis Borgia.
“This course is where I ran my first race at the Borgia Invitational in mid-October,” she said. “I joined the cross country team at the end of September when I was a sophomore in high school. My coach, Kurt Russell, pushed me to join the team late in the season after I had quit playing softball. If he hadn’t let me do that, I don’t think I would have fallen in love with the sport of long distance running like I have.”
For a time, the Borgia Invitational was one of the biggest in-season meets in Missouri. The course was packed. With much of the start and finish area on the driving range portion of the property, that was the best way to clean up all of the golf balls.
At the height of Big Driver’s popularity, Hurt and her high school teammates put on two Big Driver Fun Runs in the summers of 2007 and 2008.
“Two of my high school teammates (Andrew Tobben and Abby Glastetter) and I hosted a fundraiser 5K in the summer to help raise funds for our team trips to Michigan,” Hurt said.
The races drew a number of top runners. In the inaugural event, Dustin Dixon and Judy Dorpinghaus were the top finishes. Dixon, a St. Clair graduate, was running for Missouri Southern State University while Dorpinghaus was an established distance runner.
Dorpinghaus repeated as the winner in 2008. Eric Fernandez won the men’s title.
“That was my first experience hosting a race at Big Driver, but this was my first time hosting a more professional high school race,” Hurt said…
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