race post mortem

]The fun run is over, yay. I think it went well. As I was standing around, waiting for the first runners to come in, wearing my BRIGHT YELLOW "Race Crew" T shirt, I was looking around at all of the commotion....Hooper Stadium at our high school, with official race timers standing at the finish line, flags marking the start and finish, popups and tables all over the place with food, water, people getting ready to record times, people standing by to start cheering the runners in, people selling t shirts, LOUD race/running appropriate music blaring over the PA and people dancing to it and I thought "Hey, I started this. This was my idea. And it's happening! And it's good! "

And when the runners starting coming in, I was jumping up and down and cheering and crying (yeah, I'm a weird person), cause it's so cool to see people who have worked very hard to accomplish something very hard. I was full of admiration. Particularly for the 70 plus year old ladies out there, all brown and leathery and running hard.

A year ago, I wanted to find a fundraiser for the choir to replace fireworks sales. There was so much antipathy about fireworks in our town, and every year was a battle...find a place to sell, finding someone willing to store the fireworks truck at night, find people still willing to sell, getting permits, going through the annual fight with the city council (public meeting with angry public) and then doing the nasty job of setting up and tearing down everything every day (thousands of pounds of explosives loaded into and out of a big UHaul truck twice a day. And then having people yell at us and write letters to the editor about how ignorant and evil we are to sell fireworks. And hope and pray all night on the fourth that nobody would start a fire.

Realistically, I still think our piddly little safe and sane legal fireworks set off in controlled areas one night a year are safer than illegal fireworks set off in the boonies to avoid detection one night a year. But my goal was not to educate the public about fireworks safety. I was supposed to be making money. So I got the choir boosters to agree not to even try to sell fireworks this year. (good thing...the city banned them forever this spring) I wanted to do a FUN RUN. And lo, a lady with major running connections is in choir boosters....

So our Running Expert Ellie Lightfoot did all the work to get it going, and I did what she told me to do. I can only claim to be a good follower.

And it was GREAT. Even though we didn't make money. That's to be expected with a first year event. But I think it will grow. This year our goal was to make everything appeal to the serious runners who do these events all year, so we can attract more next year. Plus...have fun.

We did our market research well (I even polled runners at other 5Ks about their T shirt preferences) and we came up with a great product. The serious runners LOVED it. We did everything right. And the kids had fun.

Our goal...to be a part of the Gold Country Grand Prix series next year.

And to add a 10K to the race. We wanted to do a great 5K before we attempted a 10K.

My goal: to get the choir to fork up $400 to get our course certified. Nobody else in the grand prix is certified, and that's a big draw for Real Runners who are trying to get a qualifying time for major races. So we can pull in lots of people from out of the area.

Our long term goal: to make enough money to compensate for losing fireworks. But I think we can do better than that. I'm excited.

Maybe next year I'll run! Or maybe I will just become an expert in staging Fun Runs. Like I had to become an expert in selling fireworks and putting on Madrigal Dinner. Am I a diletante or a renaissance woman with obscure skills?


And what should I be doing now instead of typing? I should be folding clothes. So I will.