Marbry Gansle and Deb Baronowski with their coach Bobbi Palma on June 11, 2025, at Across the Street Pub on Western Avenue. Palma founded the Electric City Athletic Club for Girls in the ’60s to give girls a chance to participate in local and national AAU meets because of the lack of offerings for girls at the high school level. (Photo by Joyce Bassett / For the Times Union)

The Across the Street Pub is a favorite reunion spot for members of the Electric City Athletic Club for Girls. On June 11 they are shown with club t-shirts and a jacket from the ’70s and surrounding beloved coach Bobbi Palma, founder of the club. From left, in front, are Marbry Gansle, Palma and Diane Watson. In back row, Phyllis Pincher, Gina DiMaggio, Deb Baranowski and Kathy Suhrada. (Photo by Joyce Bassett / For the Times Union)

Times were fast but changes proved to be slow in women's sports for a group of track and field athletes who competed soon after Title IX became law in 1972.

An informal reunion was held on June 11 for members of the Electric City Athletic Club for Girls at Across the Street Pub in Albany. It’s a regular event timed for when 89-year-old coach Bobbi Palma returns to visit friends in the Capital Region, where she grew up and accomplished so much during her career in athletics. She now lives year-round in Tucson, Arizona.

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NYSPHSAA Hall of Fame coach Marbry Gansle, who retired from Shaker High School in 2019, was there. She was joined at the Western Avenue sports bar by teammates Phyllis Pincher, Gina DiMaggio, Kathy (Murphy) Suhrada, Diane (Soellner) Watson and Deb (Rohrmiller) Baranowski. Marbry’s daughter Ashley Gansle, the track coach at Columbia High........

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