Math professor enjoys hoops at new UMaine fitness center

ORONO – University of Maine math professor Stanley “Jerry” Farlow has been an athlete for nearly 50 years.

The 70-year-old Farlow excelled in track and field in the 800 meters at Iowa State University in the late 1950s, has run three Boston Marathons and plays basketball twice a week at the university’s new fitness center.

Farlow acknowledged he’s not the best basketball player of the bunch, but he’s out there for the love of the game and the exercise.

“I have nothing to prove,” he said. “I guess I’m lucky because I get to play with younger people.”

Farlow, who has been in UMaine’s math department since 1968, normally plays around noontime in a group of 20 players on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

His group has enjoyed pick-up games in the University’s field house; the old Memorial Gymnasium, also known as “The Pit;” and now the new fitness center.

Farlow said there are many differences between the three facilities.

“A lot of kids don’t like the floor in the field house, the rubber hurts [their] feet,” Farlow said. “I liked the Pit a little better because the light’s better in there.”

Farlow added that recreational basketball is no longer played in the Pit, which is now used for UMaine basketball and volleyball practices.

Farlow didn’t participate in any sports in high school.

The campus’ new recreational center features a running track, basketball courts, weightlifting and training facilities as well as a hot tub, which the general public can use for $10 a day.

“It’s a beautiful place,” Farlow said of the new facility.

While the field house is spacious and has four courts, a number of UM’s other teams, such as baseball, softball and track and field, hold practices in that facility, allowing for limited recreational use.

Most of the players in Farlow’s group are UM students and fellow teachers, but some big-name Black Bear hoopsters have laced up their sneakers with the likes of Farlow.

“Cindy Blodgett played with us a couple times – she’s really nice, a great player,” said Farlow, who added that former UM women’s basketball coach Trish Roberts played in his group a couple of times, too.

The middle of the day is the best time to play, Farlow said, with most UMaine students either in classes or heading to lunch.

“The students go over in the evening a lot, there’s never anyone [there] around noon except us on Tuesdays and Thursdays when we go,” Farlow said.

That schedule fits in perfectly with Farlow’s academic slate. He teaches an introductory course to abstract math Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

On court, Farlow said, trash-talking is always at a premium during the Tuesday and Thursday sessions.

“Everyone plays as hard as they can but it’s not like guys getting into each other’s face,” he said. “Sometimes you see a bunch of college freshman just out of high school trying to relive their glory days, and they get excited and mad at each other. We don’t have that.”

Farlow’s first love is basketball, but he was a strong runner in the 1970s.

His personal best in the 800 was a speedy 1 minute, 58 seconds at Iowa State, and he turned to long-distance running in the 1970s.

Farlow’s first such race was the old Brewer Mad Witch Half-Marathon in 1975, and he ran the original Paul Bunyan Marathon later that year.

His first Boston Marathon was a year later in 1976, when temperatures rose into the 90s for the mid-April race.

He ran a “three-flat” time that year, while his Boston Personal Record was a 2:40 effort in 1979.