Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Twitter Road Race - 5K Race Report

First and foremost, thank you for all your kind words about the Twitter Road Race! They've meant so much to me! I'm so glad everyone had as much fun as I did!

When I came up with the idea of organizing the TRR, I had no clue what I was getting myself into. I thought 50, maybe 100 runners, would be interested in running in this event. Yet, on January 21st, 376 runners from 14 countries laced up their running shoes, picked their own starting line, and ran in a global 5K!

As runners, I believe we are a special breed and the energy and motivation we provide each other is contagious! We are part of one big family and I think the TRR brought that to the surface! My eyes were glued non-stop to the #TwitterRoadRace trend on race day. Your tweets had me smiling ear to ear! Thank you so much for making this race possible! You rock!

I had not run in, let alone hosted a virtual run. So, this whole experience was quite unique and challenging for me. My anxiety levels were certainly a bit high throughout the race weekend! My biggest concern was making sure that the form I created for you all to enter your time worked correctly. Thankfully, Google has an extremely user friendly system that helped me design the entry and finisher's forms with relative ease. Albiet a few hiccups, I was incredibly pleased with how smoothly everything went!

The thing I loved most about the TRR was that although we ran in the same race, that's where the similarities ended! Some of us had beautiful weather to run in. Others had to contend with snow, sleet, and ice. Some took to the roads and trails. Others ran on a treadmill. Whatever the case may be, at the end of the day, we all ran the race together!

Over the past few days, I've been reading so many great blogs and tweets about your TRR experiences! Keep them coming!!! I have to give a special shout out to TRR runner, @KCtoCapeCod. I think after you read her blog about her TRR, you'll see why it's one of my favorites! Awesome run!!!

Congratulations TRR finishers! You were all part of something real special! Also, congratulations to our overall male winner, @ThinkPlanRun and our overall female winner, @legalmindtrap! Way to go!!! If you have not seen the results, they can be viewed here. Last, @hellomisspotter designed a downloadable Finishers Certificate for all that would like one!

Thanks again for making this race a reality!

Happy running!
@seedouglasrun

PS
There will be more Twitter Road Races in the future! I'll we be posting another blog soon revealing the next race date!