Monday, April 3, 2017

My Heart is Full of Gratitude

I've been trying to read all of the social media posts and see all of the pictures from this weekend. There are so many!

Every year, 35-40 key volunteers work for months leading up to race weekend. Then, a week before the race, hundreds of volunteers stuff goody bags. Race weekend needs thousands of volunteers to be successful.

Sometimes the tasks aren't easy and certainly not glamorous but people show up anyway. Over the years, they've stood in the cold and rain and wind and sun and handed out water, biked the course over and over, placed medals around necks, built stanchions and then broke them down, and so many more things that you probably can't imagine.

It's amazing.




And on top of the volunteers, there are all of the participants that choose this race. We had just over 8900 participants. That number reflects people who run in one event or in multiple events. So, some of those people chose not to run just one event but two and maybe three if they ran with their child. These folks chose to train for and participate in our hometown event. As a side note, a lot of these people also volunteered for something during pre-race preparations or at the expo.

It's amazing.

The City of Knoxville. the University of Tennessee, neighborhoods and our local businesses come out in full force. Staff from the City clean the greenways and streets and shut down roads and then keep participants safe from start to finish. The University has staff onsite all day to assist us and are very gracious when we're parking PODS and trucks in front of the stadium. Local businesses sponsor the event and volunteer and participate. Many of the participating businesses pay for their employees to run. Folks in all of the major neighborhoods get together and throw parties all over the city to make the event memorable for all of the participants.

It's amazing.

The support is overwhelming and reminds me that there is so much goodness in our community.

As I wrap up my day, my heart is full of gratitude.

See you on the roads!








No comments:

Post a Comment

A Weight Lifted

I started this blog when Jackson was a baby with the intent to write about everyday life with kiddos. There are tons of books out there on r...