EDWARDSVILLE - It's one of the most eagerly anticipated events of the summer, but the 25th anniversary Mud Mountain race, the annual fundraiser for the Edwardsville High School cross country teams, has been cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Instead, a Virtual 25 race is currently in the works, and runners will be invited to run in a 5K race, the same distance as the Mud Mountain race on SIU-Edwardsville's famed course, and submit their times for placing.
The event also serves as an unofficial reunion of Tiger cross country teams of the past, and right now, the important thing is that everyone is healthy and getting through the pandemic very well.
"All the athletes and families and everyone seems to be healthy," said race director and Edwardsville cross country coach George Patrylak, "and the former athletes seem to be doing well. There's a lot of disappointment that we can't do it this year; we had some plans of getting back together and doing some fun stuff on this year. This year, we'll call it the Virtual 25, and we'll celebrate the 25th anniversary the right way at next year's race."
As mentioned, the plan for this year is to have the runners submit their times for a 5K run, with a leaderboard a possibility. However, medals for the race won't be awarded. The biggest thing is to make sure everyone stays healthy during the pandemic while trying to find creative ways to keep everything fun.
"We were hoping we could be creative with it, but keeping everyone healthy is most important," Patrylak said.
The race is also the main fund-raising event for the Tigers' cross country team, as well as the teams at both Lincoln and Liberty middle schools, and not having the actual race itself will make things difficult. Still though, Patrylak is optimistic about having a big number of participants this year.
"We're trying to find the most cost-effective ways of doing things," Patrylak said, "and we're hoping to have a high number of entrants, because we're going to be dependent on entry fees and runner donations this year."
A decision was also made to not actively seek donations from local businesses this year, and Patrylak is encouraging people to support the local businesses as they begin to recover from the pandemic.
"We are not going to actively seek donations from businesses this year, with the community situation," Patrylak said. "Our community needs to support the businesses more than the businesses support our high school programs in general."
With the dependence on entry fees for the bulk of the fund-raising, adjustments are going to be made on all counts.
"We're hoping realistically that if we can get half the support we usually get, it'll be successful," Patrylak said. "As far as trying to raise funds for the booster club, we're not sure what our budget will be. so I think our schedule won't look like as it has in the past. We're going to hope for the best."
But the most important take away is that the programs will get some badly needed support, all involved in this year's event will be healthy, and the runners will post some good times on the leaderboard.
"Bottom line, we're going to get some support," Patrylak said, "and we hope everyone stays healthy and gets some good times in, and runs with us in spirit, just not in person."
And Patrylak is very grateful for being part of a very close-knit community of runners that supports and watches out for each other.
"It's our community of runners that make the event so successful," Patrylak said, "and I'm lucky to be a part of such a great running community. My gratitude to everyone."
