This week had two special holidays to celebrate. The first was the Cinco De Mayo celebration and all that goes with it. The other is being celebrated today as Mother’s Day. The Cinco De Mayo has a special place for me in that as far as I can remember it was the first road race held here in San Marcos. The Capital 10K was held in 1979 and was the first race I ever ran. I think there were about 2,000 runners and it was run in the park.
I remember trying to run over the short swinging bridges that were like waves from the runners in front of me. And trying to get that many runners over a narrow bridge caused a backup of runners trying to get across. It was an experience I will remember as it was my first race and between the bridges with the number of runners crowding those narrow paths it is an easy memory to have.
With that large number of runners, I thought why not have a race here in San Marcos. I talked with Warren Ledick, the Parks and Recreation Director, about it and we decided to use the Cinco De Mayo celebration as the theme. We held it out at the Civic Center and went on the access road, turned on Redwood Road (now Wonder World Drive), turned on Hwy. 123 and back on Clovis Barker loop to the Civic Center. It is hard to imagine what it was like back then compared to the roads today.
I still have the T-shirt from that race as a relic of the first race. The race grew over the years and at one time had over 300 runners. The race moved to the Courthouse and ran down San Antonio Street and finished by the Courthouse. The Overall Champions received a big sombrero and a colorful serape with the race name and race champion embroidered on it. The race was a very popular race until a non-runner became the race director and ordered 300 shirts. He called me on a Tuesday about the race on Saturday and asked if I could help.
Since there was no advertising of the race about 30 runners showed up. They still had to pay for 300 shirts and lost a lot of money. That was the last time the Cinco De Mayo 10K or 5K was held here. It has had a few start up tries since then but has never regained the status that it had during its glory days. The race is still a popular race in nearby towns and has a good turnout.
Mother’s Day is one of the most popular celebrations that people gather for. Since I was recalling the Cinco De Mayo and how it is often used as a theme for a race I tried to recall if there was a race for Mother’s Day. It is a popular celebration but more of a family get-together to celebrate mothers. A lot of mothers are runners but as a celebration it seems that sponsoring a run in her honor is not very popular. And next month the same will hold true for Father’s Day celebrations. I may be mistaken about the number of runs for these two special holidays but trying to remember those days as a major running celebration is not well known.
When you think of holidays or celebrations to sponsor a run it is easy to list July 4th(250 years this year, so this will be a big race day) and Thanksgiving with turkeys and hams for awards. Christmas is not a bad theme and New Year’s runs are very popular.
After the holidays theme, races come down to popular causes. There are a number of runs sponsored by civic or service clubs to raise funds for their charities. There was a popular run with university students at the Homecoming celebration. The hospital had a popular run years ago but the course was all on state roads and when authorities found out the permits and insurance were canceled for that run.
Most road races are from groups that are raising funds for a cause. Scholarships for students, funding non-profit groups that provide service to people, and environmental causes such as river clean up. A good number of runners look at where their entry money is going.
