07/14/2020
Ma*****st,
Yesterday an email went out from the acting superintendent of schools for Putnam County, TN. The first day of school is August 3rd. That means that all corpses will need to be removed from the parking lot outside Cane Creek Elementary School - the parking lot that you will be blessed to run through some five times on August 2nd. Please be mindful of removing the corpses from school property, for those kids have already been through a lot. No need to make their first day back that scarring.
Yes, the Blister is still able to be held in person. As with everything else in 2020, it will not be the same. It will most likely be worse. While suffering and stupidity are both involved with this race, I want to make sure that the spread of any infectious disease will be mitigated while still having the "race" occur. There will be a few changes to accomplish this:
- Staggered start times in order to help assure social distancing. People will be 2-3 minutes apart starting at 6 AM. If you want to start with another person because you are scared of the course, you can. No more than three people can start at a time though.- Groups of no more than four people on the course in order to assure safe passing.
- Be safe when passing others on the course; please pass on the left. You will need to announce that you are about to pass in order to give appropriate time for the other person to fully move to the right and you to move to the left.
- Please stay to the right of the trail on the areas where people are going both ways. (This is the spectator area and the way out to the school parking lot.)
-There will be no main aid station; however, you may bring a cooler and whatever else you will need. These can be placed on the course - probably most people will place them in the middle of the figure eight as has been done in the past. You will need to be able to complete the race in a self-sustained way. The race will not be providing water coolers on the course or frozen water bottles as was done in the past. Even with keeping with the theme of the race, I do not feel like I can recruit volunteers or ask that people commonly share a cooler.
-Spectators can still come and participate in heckling. Encourage anyone attending with you and not running to be mindful of the runners and social distance. Remember the course is not closed to the public though.
There is another option. If you want to take the option of a virtual marathon, please email me as soon as you can (so I can plan out start times). This will mean that you will run 26.2 miles on Sunday August 2nd. The run cannot be started until the sun rises and must be finished before the sun sets. Any run will need to be recorded on GPS with the time and day. Virtual races are not eligible for prize money, however. After confirmation of completion, I'll mail your swag to you (shorts too if you signed up in time).
-The Sadist
