What
Despite the Lilac Bloomsday Run’s high-flying reputation as one of the world’s top running events, all runners are welcome, whether on feet or on wheels, whether young or young-at-heart. This race was created to encourage fitness, promote fun, and honor the human spirit.
The first Lilac Bloomsday Run took place one late spring afternoon in 1977. Founded by Don Kardong, a local runner who had participated in the 1976 Olympic Marathon, it was dubbed “Run With the Stars.” More than 1,000 runners participated, including Olympic medalist Frank Shorter.
Since then, this event has consistently grown and gained fame. It has been included in the RRCA (Road Runners Club of America) and PRRO (Professional Road Running Organization) circuits, and it attracts some of the top competitive racers in the world.
However, competition is not all this event is about. Bloomsday has spawned numerous fitness programs for area children, and the “Fit For Bloomsday” curriculum was set up in 1987. Today it prompts around 6,000 elementary school students every year to get in shape and stay fit in order to participate. The race organizers also choose worthy causes to support every year.
The 12K race begins at 9 a.m. and is open to all walkers, runners, strollers, wheelchairs, and assisted wheelchairs. Bloomsday organizers support the participation of everyone who can safely complete the course distance. They do, however, dissuade the youngest racers, age 12 and downward, from trying to compete for fast times. Event managers want to help these participants focus on fun fitness rather than prizes.
The course begins on Riverside Avenue and winds alongside the Spokane River. This scenic, peaceful route then crosses Latah Creek and proceeds down tree-lined roads. Participants cross the Spokane River on the T.J. Menach Bridge and advance across Doomsday Hill. The river is the final goal as runners make their way toward it again to finish the course.
When: May 6, 2018
Where: Spokane, Washington
How: Register here: https://www.athlinks.com/event/8432
What Else?
Don Kardong, the man who launched this annual event, picked the name of this race by combining Spokane’s well-known association with the lilac and a name literary scholars use to describe the day depicted in James Joyce’s novel “Ulysses.” The idea is that a road race is a grand campaign and a search for Truth — uppercase T. Joyce said the experience is not unlike the odyssey of Ulysses, undertaken when he returned from the Trojan War and documented by Homer, the Greek poet.
In Joyce’s novel, a man spends one day wandering the streets of Dublin, Ireland. This journey is seemingly mundane yet endlessly epic. Event founder Kardong envisioned the Lilac Bloomsday Run as an analogy for what people do in their lives each day. They traverse hazards and face challenges in large and small ways, face fears and battle monsters, and journey through the hours of their lives, each second being a choice. In the end, the race participants, like everyone, find peace and safety as they come home.
