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Runologie Wins ITB Gold By Not Closing Raleigh Streets
On the nicest Sunday afternoon in February that I can ever remember, five runners raised money for charities and didn’t negatively impact anyone in Raleigh. The first ever “Run For Good” consisted of five runners on three treadmills placed on the sidewalk outside of Runologie and State of Beer on Hillsborough Street. No roads were closed. No businesses lost money as a result of streets being shut down. No one was standing on the corner ringing a cow bell at 7:00 am. No one had to drive all over town just to get to Rise Biscuits and Donuts or brunch. No drunken concert “performance” by the lead singer of Smash Mouth. No fake studies that claim the race had an $8.13 million economic impact were conducted. It was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. So amazing that I made a film about it that I’ll probably send to Sundance.
Two individuals and a relay team ran for four hours on those treadmills to raise money for three different organizations. Jason Tischer, Umstead 100 defending champ, raised funds for Team Tassy, an organization that pays for job creation and job training programs to eliminate poverty in Haiti. Omer Abdulrahman, a refugee from Sudan, raised money for the ACLU of North Carolina. The relay team of Brent Francese, Alex Warren, and Gavin Coombs (Uwharrie 20 Miler defending champ) raised funds for Common Cause NC, a group working to end gerrymandering. Runologie donated 15% of sales that day to the non-profits. Over $4,000 was raised at the event, which was sponsored by Runologie and State of Beer, with donations from Lysaght & Associates, John Montgomery Violins, and many more.
This is how all races in Raleigh should be done. Have five people run while everyone else drinks beer and raises money for good causes. I’ve always said we need to run road races on the beltline. It’s roughly the distance of a marathon and it wouldn’t impact any ITB roads. But this is an even better solution. Why stop at 3 treadmills? I don’t care if every sidewalk in downtown Raleigh is lined with thousands of treadmills, as long as it means the streets are never shut down and I never miss another brunch. And it’s not just for running, the possibilities are endless. Dogs of ITB treadmill runs, babies of ITB treadmill first steps parties. This is a billion dollar idea.
I hereby, quid pro quo, move to only run Raleigh races in this manner from now until the end of time. I second that motion and will now send it along via Twitter to the City Council so that they can make it into a law. I’m pretty sure that’s how laws work now, but I still need to check with my lawyer, Stacy Miller.
