So where to start? Well, this was race 25 on the year! My 38th race overall. I breached the 1,100 mile mark on the year about midway through this race. It was not a PR race for me, it was about 2 minutes off of that, but I’ll take a 9:31 pace overall this late in the season.
The numbers are all good, and they do keep driving us toward faster paces, but this race again reminded my why I do this crazy Running Thing. It’s really about the PEOPLE! I’ve said it before and I will say it again, the Running Community is Amazing.
I had never run this race in the past, and had it not of been for my good friend Amy Kentner, the Race Organizer, talking me into driving over, I may not have bothered. Thank you Amy, I’m really glad I went.
So I left my house at 4:30 am on a cool Saturday Morning in December and about 2 hours later, I arrived in downtown Cleveland at Union Square. I parked and went into Packet Pick Up and I met up with 6 of my running friends from Toledo. These amazing ladies had spent the night and had already picked up their packets and were just lingering about the staging area inside the Hotel.
They waited for me while I checked in, and then we wondered about the hotel, seeing what kind of trouble we could get into, and believe me, this group can find it! We met a group of Elf’s that were looking for trouble! LOL.
Then of course we had to pay homage to the Leg Lamp! You may want to STOP here and re-watch the movie! I Triple-Dog Dare You! I’ll Wait………. OK, back now? Good! Wasn’t that fun?
Mary Jo, clearly the Ring Leader of our little group, was ready to Get This Party Started!
The Ladies all had their Sparkle Skirts on and they posed with Teddy Moore a.k.a Mrs. Shields who played the Teacher in the movie.
The Christmas Story House Run, is a charity race that supports the maintenance of the actual house that was used in the filming of the movie. Amy told me that they had over 5,800 5k and 10k runners registered.
The 5k and 10k course starts at Union Square in downtown Cleveland, heads east along the river, then over a bridge and passes through a few neighborhoods around the Tremont District where the Christmas Story house is located The 5k stops at the house (Bus’s return the 5k runners back to the start line), and the 10k circles the block and then returns to Union Square via the same rout that we came out on.
The 10k runners all received a nice “Spinner” metal.
Looking forward to adding this race to my MUST DO list for next near. Its a fun, well run race and I highly recommend it.
Until next time … Happy Running!
Rich,
Have you ever run a race in a Costume? (I’m not big on costumes, but that will change soon, watch for it in January!)
Do you like 10k races?
Leave a comment below, I’d love to hear from you!
Running in the 419 
The Holiday Hustle is the only race I really “dress up” for – and that’s a string of LED lights and some sort of hat/antlers. One time I showed up at a race in costume, and I swear I was the only one dressed up! I don’t like those moments!! Looks like you have a good time. That elf picture is great!
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