Home of Purdue Half Marathon

HOME OF PURDUE HALF MARATHON A GO!

First of all, we would like to thank everyone for an outpouring of your support for the inaugural Home of Purdue Half Marathon October 24, 2010.  We are particularly enthused about several Greater Lafayette Metro area communities offering to host the event.

While we still hold out hope for the Cities of Lafayette and West Lafayette, it has become clear that they plan to breach our agreement to allow us to use a course that we designed and was approved last fall.  Reinke Sports Group has done everything in a forthright, honorable manner and I am sorry to say that we have not seen the same from the other side.   Therefore we are going to take the high road at this point and make a decision on the course options in front of us.  We have some very exciting options and it will not be an easy decision.

Meanwhile, several prominent local individuals have offered to help mediate and we certainly welcome their intervention.  Having said that, we hope to announce which course will host the event this year, get back to the business of creating a fun-filled "Home of Purdue" experience for all of participants (which includes runners from some 25 states and 4 foreign countries at this time) and hope everyone can get back to what we all enjoy first and foremost - "simply running".  We will still continue our efforts to work with the cities in the future but now is the time to get back on track with this terrific event.  With over "850" registered runners (and walkers) with some 2 1/2 months to go, this should be on track to have some 1500-2000 participants.  Therefore, we urge you to join us and tell your friends what a great weekend we plan to have in "Boiler" country!

The USRA Half Marathon Series (usrahm.com), of which the Home of Purdue Half Marathon is a part of, has already had some 10,000 participants thus far this year, while over 10,000 are projected this fall in our 8 remaining 2010 events.  I am writing this from Louisville where I have been brought in as one of 30 event rights holders from around the country to meet with  over 800 representatives of Convention & Visitors Bureaus, Municipalities and Sports Commissions from around the country, to present our opportunities and all "44" of my appointment slots are filled up by communities wanting to host one of our Half Marathons.  As you can see by the projected 2011 schedule below, we anticipate being in nearly 30 cities next year (Please note Home of Purdue Half Marathon for 2012 is scheduled for October 16, 2012) and we are also about to announce a major/international Marathon for early 2012 in one of the last "top 25" markets in the country without a Marathon.  You all will be among the first to know!

We again want to thank everyone for their patience and support and we plan to make the formal announcement within the next few days once all of the details are finalized!