A Run to Remember Through the Streets of Boston
By Christopher Russell
Cool Running
In four short years, Boston's
Run to Remember has grown to become the fourth largest race in the area. It is a mature, well-managed event that leverages all the best that Boston has to offer. It is still the only major event to run through the center of this great city on the Charles.
Boston has always fancied itself the hub of the sporting world with its pile of championship professional teams, gaggle of college superstars, the oldest marathon and a hot spot of running to boot. Now the Run to Remember piles on with a gravity of its own as the major running event in May.
This is the second year the race has been held in May--and the people love the new date.
The original March date made the Run to Remember one of the regional must-do warm-up races for the Boston Marathon. With the move to May, there was a chance of losing that traditional New England crowd of dedicated spring marathoners. And indeed some of them were wondering where their favorite tune-up had gone in the spring of 2007.
The new date held on to the party loyalists who loved a race in town, and was ravenously embraced by a whole new crowd of runners.
Citizens of Runner Nation (The Runnerati) flocked to the new date and made it an unbelievable success. It was as if they were saying, “Someone finally figured it out: a nice flat half marathon right through the streets of Boston in perfect weather. That’s what we were waiting for!” Whether by strategy or happenstance, the Run to Remember in May is extremely popular. For those of you who like slush there are still plenty of races to run in March!
Hitting a home run
Boston’s Run to Remember has become so popular because it hits the mark in so many ways. The beautiful course runs through the heart of the city. The event has grown to have a gravity of its own; runners feel they have been part of something big.
It is a destination race drawing runnerati from all over the world. People come for the weekend-long celebration. They come to run the race, see the city and visit other local environs.
From the beginning, it was designed to scale up and accommodate the great outpouring it has seen with no hassles. The Seaport World Trade Center provides a capacious center of gravity within walking distance from the city hub.
You will be treated to the cobbled streets of the city and a tour of the scenic Boston Harbor waterfront where 600 plus years of adventurers have anchored. You will run out the bike path along the Charles towards Cambridge, home to Harvard and MIT. On this path you will be following in the heady footsteps trod by many a famous statesman, citizen and academic over the years.
Boston is a pedestrian city. It is a big city, but not outlandishly so. It is an old city, but thoroughly modern--not a museum piece. It is a thriving, bustling place of people. It is a seaport with the wet tang of salt spray from the cold Atlantic in the air. It is a beautiful place in May.
Boston is old enough to have been lain out before city planning and never redesigned by catastrophe. It retains its non-linear meandering feel. Everything was put out in the expectation of pedestrians and horses not at the maniacal behest of car driven commuters. This makes Boston a walking and running city small enough to circumnavigate in a short foot race--and to be blanketed by a 13.1-mile trot.