5K Festival set for May 17
The Niagara Olympic Club will be hosting its first-ever 5K Festival May 17 at the club’s facility at 78 Louth Street in St. Catharines.
The festival will include seven five-kilometre races starting at 10 a.m. The races will be run in seven sections with slowest to fast. Sections include runners who run five kilometres in: 40 minutes plus; 35-40 minutes; 30-35 minutes; 25-30 minutes; 20-25 minutes; 18-20 minutes; and, 15-18 minutes. There is a maximum 25 racers per section.
“When runners do their entries, they can pick their seed time. It is going to go for six hours. We will start at 10 in the morning and it will go to 6. It will be race after race after race and it is designed for the recreational to the elite athlete and for road runners who want to see what their clean, true 5K time is with no hills or obstructions from traffic,” NOC president Sharon Stewart said.
The Niagara Olympic Club originally wanted to organize a five-kilometre road race but there were too many logistical issues, including road closures.
“We wanted to do something that was really fun and a fundraiser for the project and we wanted to do it at our facility. We want to build community awareness” she said.
The ‘project’ is a $1.4 million renovation to the facility which includes: shaving off the existing track surface and remediating the underlying asphalt to make sure it’s ready for the new surface; relocating the pole vault runway parallel to the long and triple jump runways to make more space for the athletes and spectators; and, rebuilding the steeplechase pit to match new standards (the new standard for the depth is 0.5 metres and the pit is currently 0.78 metres deep).
It is hoped the renovations will be completed in time to host the 2026 Ontario Federation of School Athletics Association track and field championships.
The day will be a festival on and off the track with food trucks, including Smoke and Moonshine, and beer from the Decew Falls Brewing Company.
“It is going to be a super fun day. I have even personally invited the mayor. We want to have the Mayor’s Race,” Stewart said. “It is going to be a celebration of our facility and having the opportunity to bring it back to its glory days.”
To register, runners should visit the trackie.com website.
Entry deadline is May 1 with T-shirt guaranteed and May 14 late entry and no T-shirt guaranteed. The final schedule with seeded sections will be posted May 15.
Bib pickup at the track will start at 9 a.m. with the first race scheduled for 10 p.m. The cost to enter is $35.
