Lehi Roundup 5k/10k Race Recap

With this post, I am officially caught up on my blogging will be caught up with the Summer about Christmas. I ran the Lehi Roundup race on Saturday June 25. I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "He ran the Utah Valley Half Marathon on June 11, Ragnar Wasatch Back June 17-18 and now he's done the Lehi Roundup race? The man is an ANIMAL!"

While I am an animal, I ran the race, but didn't actually run in the race.

How does that work exactly? It's long and involved and took almost a year to happen.

Here are the details. We'll need to journey back in time so follow the directions below to get the best effect.

{Shake your head back and forth very fast until you feel as though the world is becoming fuzzy...this is because you are travelling back in time and not because your brain is banging against the side of your head.}

On a warm June morning in 2010 . . .
I'm preparing myself to run the Pocatello marathon in September. The roundup 10k is part of the 15 miles I am planning on running for the day. The course is different this year than in the past. It starts 3.5 miles from my house. I run to the start as my warm up for the race. The course has changed 3 or 4 times over the past few weeks and finally has settled on 2 loops of the 5k which includes a couple steep hills.

They did something really odd in starting the 5K run/walk fifteen minutes in front of the 10k. I weave in and out of the walkers and strollers. The first lap I have police and the second lap the police have disappeared. I'm not thrilled about how the race was organized nor the course.

Evening of that same night . . . 
I'm remembering the race and decide that sending off an email to the race director with some suggestions for next year would be a great idea.

August 2010 . . .

I became the race director for the 2011 Lehi Roundup 5K/10K.

You can read about that here and the results of that email here.

{Shake your head back and forth very fast until you feel as though the world is becoming fuzzy...you are now travelling back to near present day. The slight blurriness caused by the constant shaking will disappear-hopefully}


Race Week 2011 . . .

Guess what Costco donated?

The Lehi Roundup 5K/10K is part of the week-long city celebration. As a committee member, I also get to be at some of the other Roundup events. This makes for a busy week. My wife is in charge of building one of the floats for the miniature parade held on Friday night and Saturday morning which means I'm assisting in the float construction.

For the past months, I have been working to get sponsors for the race, order shirts, stress over sign ups, work with local grocery stores to get food donated, etc. It's exhausting. I've been working on some new marketing techniques that involved kids holding signs about the race while dancing on street corners social media and partnering with other races to get the word out about the race. There is a new half marathon and 5K that is being held on the same day as the Roundup race. I'm thinking that we'll take a hit on registrations, but as the race gets closer the registrations keep coming in.

Packet pickup

First year ever that participants got a tech shirt. Score!

 My office and living room has become packet stuffing central. There are t-shirts and bags everywhere. We ordered 100 extra shirts and have completely run out. We got some of the shirts from 2010 to give out and have run out of those too. We receive another 30 sign ups during the packet pickup.

June 24
It's 10:00 pm on Friday. With cold Dominos pizza in my wife's Jeep and me in the van, we set out to get the course marked for the morning. At 11:30 I run out of the color for the 10k and we have to do a run to Walmart to get more spray paint. At 1:30 am, both courses are marked. I'm debating whether the 2 1/2 hours of sleep is going to be of any value. I opt to give it a try and set the alarm. Surprisingly, when the alarm goes off at 4:00 am I am awake and ready for the day.

This is either great anticipation for the start or we're
short bathroom facilities.

At 4:30 am, the family is cutting up fruit and I'm dropping off water containers on the course. At 5:00 am the city parks people deliver tables for registration and drop off the tables to the water stations. At 6:00 am the High School volunteers start arriving. Race day registration opens at 6:15 am and we're actually running really smoothly. 7:00 am the race starts. Official count stands at 469 registered runners.

Rockin' cool medals for the age group winners.

Despite some snafus with the timing and some elites that missed a turn, the race goes smoothly. I hear some grumbling from runners who registered the day of the race but didn't get all the bells and whistles that the runners who registered two months ago received. My answer to that? TOUGH! Register earlier.


{Shake your head back and forth very fast. If you're still able to walk straight after this, then you obviously missed a step. Go back, re-read this and make sure you get the shaking right. I am not liable for anyone stuck in the past.}


Present Day

This way they are covered in case they
have to answer a call.

I just got the photos from my photographer friend and fellow runner. I am working on a post race survey to get out in the next day or two. I heard from the city that a street I couldn't have the runners cross because it was considered a state road has now been given to the city. Next year I'll have a lot more freedom to develop a course. I'm looking forward to being bigger and better next year.