Fireball Turns 40!
July 16, 2024The Springbrook Splash 5k/10k on July 20 could have been a washout, but the heavy rains held off for most of the runners looking to get their run on that Saturday morning. The week leading up to the race was full of doom and gloom on the forecast, but somehow, we were able to call in some favors to the weather gods for a relatively cool and dry run! The best news was due to some construction on the greenways, everyone left with a course PR!
Even the kids got into the action with a 1-mile Kids run to get us going! We had a record number of kids registered with 33! We are loving watching the kids get into running at an early age. Twenty-five young runners took to the course with Adalyn Diggs from Seymour, TN flying in to the finish in 7:57! The 5k runners didn’t disappoint with Ronnie Cross securing overall male (18:19) and Kelly Fox for overall female (23:53). The 10k course was a double loop of fun and our overall male, Abdul Jaber, came in at a blistering 33:49 while our overall female, Peighton Meske, came in at an
impressive 35:56!
This year, we partnered with the Blount County Sheriff’s department to help raise funds for Officer McCowan and Eggers. Five dollars of every registration went directly to
support them or their families. With your support, we were able to give their foundation a check for $2200!! Thank you all so much! After the race, runners were able to take advantage of our amazing venue – Springbrook Pool! We can’t thank City of Alcoa Parks and Recs enough for continuing to allow us to utilize this fun facility! So many runners cooling off in the pool or sliding down the slides – quite the site to see!
As is custom, each participant got their beach towel, but this year marked the return of the high-quality towels that actually wipe sweat and water away! While we loved all the colors of the past couple of years’ towels, the overwhelming response to bringing back these old favorites was heard! Thank you, Patdome Promotions, and especially Tanya Ickowitz, for giving us something fun! Thank you, Todd Temple with T2 Design, for crafting us a super cool logo! Patdome also provided the cool age group awards of the reversible bucket hats! They really do create the things you wish existed!
And finally, the best for last, our Volunteers! You all rock and it was a blessing to work with such great people! From our ever-present KTC volunteers to the Alcoa HS Cross Country Team and the Central HS Swim Team – we couldn’t do these races without you! Thank you, Teresa Williams, our volunteer coordinator extraordinaire for making sure everyone knew where to go and what to do! C. John Chavis continues showing us he’s not just a speedy runner, but he has a great singing voice too, as he so beautifully sang our National Anthem.
