Boilermaker Road Race officials announced the Boilermaker would be held virtually this year due to safety restrictions in place to stop the spread of coronavirus.
Expo....no post-race party.....no race.
Boilermaker road race officials today announced the difficult decision to run the race virtually this year....unwilling to gamble with the health and safety of tens of thousands of runners, volunteers and spectators.
Team coverage tonight.
Newschannel 2's joleen ferris is live at the finish line with how this will work.
Race founder, earle reed, referred to the good old days, when all we had to worry about was the weather on race day.
But this year, a global pandemic brought the threat of more harm than any rainshower.
Donovan several months ago, the coronavirus caused immediate chaos in the roadracing industry, where mass gatherings are unavoidable.
In the end, the 2020 race was over before it started, unable to outrun the ruthless pandemic "virtually every ingredient that makes the boilermaker so special, unfortunately, works against us in this situation.
We're an event with 19,000 runners, 4500 volunteeres and untold numbers of spectators.
Our runners hail from 47 states and multiple countries" and so race officials announced today that the 43rd running of the boilermaker...will be done virtually.
Both a very difficult and easy decision, because the first priority of race officials has always been the safety and well being of runners, volunteers and spectators 18:48 "to have utica ny and the boilermaker become a hotspot heading into fall with covid -19...all the good work that's been done in 42 years would circle that drain and go down" still happening this year: the charity bib program, wheelchair division, corporate cup and high school challenges, and age group awards.
Not happening this year: the elite runner division, prize money and the health and fitness expo.
You have until noon, june 30th, to decide what to do regarding the virtual race.
Race officials hope you....or at least your registration fee, will stay in it, in order to ensure the race's survival 11:28 "a total washout or poor participation in 2020 will not only significantly impact a variety of our community outreach programming but also jeopardize our ability to continue the boilermaker as we know it going forward" for now, race officials will work on making the virtual 2020 running memorable.... and hope next year will be back to normal 16:41 "i'll see everybody on july 11th, 2021" how's the virtual boilermaker work?
5 and 15k runners run the course of your choice...treadmill or even the actual race course, between september 1st and 13th.......and report your time to the boilermaker no later than noon, september 13th.
All virtual, all online.
Want to mention-the youth run won't be run in person, either.
They're talking about doing that virtually, too.
10,000 runners are signed up.
That leaves room for 4500 more.
Back to you.
The 19,000 participants of the Boilermaker Road Race, between the 5K and 15K races, will have a different look on race day. While..
