His is a story we’ve heard, seen, and read many times before: born in the province and raised in the slums, abandoned by his mother, raised by his blue-collared father, walked to school, realized he could run, did so without shoes, was seen by a talent scout, earned a scholarship, ran in a marathon, created a marathon, and became a millionaire. It’s a story we know all too well. But this one is different: he wears an afro.

Tall, lanky, and with skin brown from spending afternoons under the sun, Rio dela Cruz, 27, is a child of the streets. A native of Bato, Camarines Sur and the youngest of 14 children, dela Cruz was barely a year old when his mother left the family leaving all parental and nurturing duties to Rio’s father and grandfather. This led to his first foray into entrepreneurship: harvesting kopra at an uncle’s farm for two Pesos a day. With mounting problems on how to sustain their large family, it seemed like the obvious thing to do was simply run away from it all. While Rio didn’t exactly do that, he did however, learn to run. “Ever since I was a child, my basic game was running,” he recalls.

It was upon taking the train to Manila in 1985 that the young Rio saw the world beyond the rickety corners of their shanty, and the vast expanding space before him. With an allowance of one Peso a day, dela Cruz began attending public school, enduring the daily three-kilometer walk. However his ideal mode of transportation was running. “During my elementary days, I would always observe my friends. They were engaged in running,” says dela Cruz. “I thought to myself: ‘I think I can do that.’ Then later on my PE teacher invited my two classmates to try out for the team.” As luck would have it, the other guy didn’t make the cut so Rio took it upon himself to approach the coach. “Sabi ko (I said), ‘Can I try out? Then I removed my shoes and began to run. I was first, and that was the start.”

With advice from his coach the following year, dela Cruz shifted from being a sprinter to a long distance runner. “Back then,” he recalls, “I was running barefoot every time since I couldn’t afford to buy running shoes.” Thanks to a generous neighbor, he received his first pair of running shoes. And although they were a few sizes too small, he managed to make it work for him by cutting the front end open, exposing his toes. All the while the lanky kid with the afro was beating more senior athletes with years of running experience under their belt. Soon, the coach of the University of the Philippines (UP) took notice and offered dela Cruz a slot on the varsity track team.

College proved to be a turning point in his career. After being named Rookie of the Year and winning two silver medals in 2001 in his freshman year, dela Cruz began breaking and establishing records, winning more medals, and soon joined the National Team in his second year in college. In 2004, popular sporting brand Nike noticed the running kid with an afro and signed him up to become an endorser. “Two months before my graduation, UP hired me as a coach for the track team.” It was also during this time that dela Cruz began to teach running one-on-one. His clients, company presidents and CEOs, actors and socialites, made him the running coach to the country’s running elite. And Rio became Coach Rio.

“At that time, I was already thinking of organizing races myself.” With a challenge from his then girlfriend that he couldn’t do it, the then 25-year-old dela Cruz took it upon himself to prove her wrong. Armed with nothing but his experience as a racer and a little over a hundred thousand Pesos of his own money, dela Cruz took to organizing his own race. It was a one-man team–from producing registration materials, designing flyers, looking for sponsors, creating the race route, applying for permits, delivering registration forms, and even creating jerseys. “I based it on experience. Since I always race, I already had an idea on what the basic needs of a runner are in an event.” And in August of 2007, the grounds of the University of the Philippines was swarmed by nearly two thousand runners participating in The Great UP Run. The result was an event worthy of its name. “That was where it all began,” dela Cruz says, “the notion that if Coach Rio organizes a race, it’s a quality event.”

Now, in only two years’ time this veteran of over twenty races in more than four countries, has managed to make himself and his full head of hair a brand that holds quality and world-class racing events popular amongst the country’s running community. To put it into perspective, his last race, the 2009 Timex Run held last November, drew in over 4000 participants and cost 5.7 million Pesos. “After that event, I felt challenged to do better. I really think I can do better,” says Rio.

And better, he did. In 2007, dela Cruz established Entraineur, an events and sports management company that handles corporate accounts. In 2008, he launched Finishline.ph together with business partner Vince Mendoza, an online sports management company that organizes races. And just last year, he launched Run Rio Incorporated which holds dela Cruz’s own running series called The RunRio Trilogy–a yearly triple combination of three major running events, and RunRio Sportswear–Rio’s own running apparel brand.

The success of dela Cruz in such short a time is nothing short of stunning. “I think what they like about me is my enthusiasm as a runner to create a good race,” he says, “And then, of course, the innovation I put in my races, because if you get stuck in the usual or traditional event, nothing will happen. My technique is to bring innovation in my races and create quality events. That’s the key to my success.”

Currently, dela Cruz is training for the Holy Grail of marathons, the Boston Marathon in April of this year for which he qualified, and the New York Marathon in November. But for this kid from the province, the ultimate dream is as big as his afro and as far as the kilometers he’s run: to find himself at the starting line in the city with the same name as his: the 2016 Rio Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The barefoot-running kid with an afro has become the running guru still with an afro. However, he now makes it a habit to slip on some shoes when he runs. When asked how many pairs he now has, “More than a hundred pairs,” he answers matter-of-factly. And how many of those did he buy himself? “Not one.”

PHOTO CREDITS
www.runrio.com