THURSTON WOODS RUN FOR THE RESIDENTS 5K (Sturgis - 2021 - 5K)
Thurston Woods Run for the Residents 5K 2021 Photos
50 Mile Drive
Registration:
There were two
websites with identical descriptions for the Thurston Woods Run for the Residents
5K. RunSignUp’s description was copied
from Thurston Woods website. You could
only register on RunSignUp for the race.
Race info was divided into the following categories on their website:
Registration Link
Place
Description
Event Location
Event Times
Registration Fees
Kids Rate
T-shirts
Weather Disclaimer
The best part about the
Thurston Woods registration was that kids 10 and under could run the 5K free
without a shirt. Money from the event
went to purchase covid supplies so that residents of Thurston Woods could see
their families more frequently with the current covid restrictions. The Thurston Woods website was very easy to
navigate.
Packet pick-up was under the drop off area at the entrance to Thurston Woods. I was given the wrong bag with a raffle prize attached to it. I went back to registration, gave them back the winning raffle envelope, and kept my bag. The raffle envelope had someone else named “Amanda” on it and that’s why they had gotten things mixed up. I wish I had been a raffle winner. The registration table was very well organized and clean. I got a picture of the nice woman in charge of the table.
Course:
The course started heading west out of Thurston Woods. We were only 100 feet from North Franks Avenue. The majority of participants did not know to turn immediately right and follow Oswald Boulevard past the Thurston Woods building to Alder Lane. I’ve never had a start where everyone in the lead went the wrong way. People started yelling and pointing to turn around. You can see it on the video Jason got of the start. Had Jason been across the street he would have gotten a great video of the starting mistake. Luke and I were in the middle of the starting group. We only went a few feet off course before we saw a group of runners heading towards us and changed direction. We ran through independent living duplexes called, The Village Homes. Many of the residents were outside sitting in chairs smiling and clapping. I’ll never forgot the older woman with the big smile in the teal blue chair. After seeing the residents, we went out on a dirt trail going around the complex until we ended up right back on Frank Avenue close to the start. We saw Jason, Ryan and Will again. After leaving them we went into a Sturgis subdivision and passed the one-mile marker. The rest of the course was Sturgis subdivisions, one water station on Lakeview Drive and an end through Thurston Woods Park. We got to weave around in the park and run right past the Sturgis water tower taking the long way back behind Thurston Woods. We finished in a different location than we started on Oswald Road by a pond with a fountain.
Swag:
Our 5K brown paper bags had really nice personalized bibs with the Thurston Woods logo on it. Luke and I got consecutive numbers again. We received awesome light blue short sleeve shirts with a big Thurston Woods tree logo on it, the name of the run and date of the race in big font. I really liked how big the logo and font were on the shirt. Thurston Woods did a great job with their shirts. The image transfer and lettering is solid and isn’t the type that concerns me with rubbing off after multiple washes. We got a mini hand sanitizer bottle and a free Dilly Bar coupon for the Sturgis DQ two miles from the run.
Food:
They had apples, bananas, oranges and granola bars nearly separated in big medal bowls. There were a lot of full-sized water bottles on a table next to the food for participants. The post-race food was in the same area as registration under the drop-off area by the main building. It was underneath a brick canopy with lots of shade. I talked to a man at the post-race food tables about running 5Ks. He was very happy with his finishing time and thought Luke was amazing being for being so young.
Awards:
There were no overall or age group awards for the Thurston Woods Run for the Residents 5K. It was meant to be a fun run and means of continued support for the residents of Thurston Woods. It was an inaugural run!
City Notes:
East Chicago Road in
Sturgis was like a mini version of Ford Road in Canton. It had a lot of stores, fast foods and
restaurants. Exceptionally cool
buildings included: The Sturgis Young Auditorium, The mural on the Five Lakes
Coffee building, Sturgis Police and Fire Station and the Strand Theater. I liked the look and architecture of those
buildings. The police and fire station
was one of my favorite buildings. Sturgis
had a lot of unique businesses. On our
way to DQ to get our free Dilly Bars we passed a Hot N’ Now. I knew it was unique but I didn’t know just
how rare it was. The Sturgis Hot N’ Now is
the only surviving Hot N’ Now left of 100 locations that were in the U.S in 1990. By 2003, a year before the company’s bankruptcy,
Hot N’ Now only had 44 locations left in three states. In 2016 the Bay City Hot N’ Now had a fire
leaving the Sturgis Hot N’ Now the only remaining operating store left. Jason commented as we passed it that his dad
used to love getting their Olive Burgers.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_%27n_Now) I have to try a famous
olive burger the next time I run near Sturgis.
The Sturgis Hot N’ Now could be gone in a few years with the company’s
sad history.
Sturgis had a really nice downtown with a lot of shops. We went into The Door Gallery. The owner was a really nice man. We found so many artisan treasures. We bought a ceramic mixing bowl with beautiful colors. It had a pouring spout and a handle crafted on. If we could afford it, we would buy all our dishes and home décor from local artists, woodworkers etc. I love that we have some really special items that we have gotten over the years. There were so many things we could have bought at The Door Gallery with the variety and selection.
We walked through downtown
Sturgis taking pictures. I saw another
beautiful hummingbird mural on a building.
Sturgis was clean and the stores seemed well kept like they were renovated
and maintained on a regular basis. Some shops
were in the midst of having work done. Shops
and restaurants were maintained in a way that kept the building’s historical
charm. The Craftsman’s Daughter had the
best shop name.
We stopped at the Sturgis Farmer’s Market during our hunt for the Sturgis city sign. It was small this particular weekend with only three vendors but we still found awesome Amish cinnamon rolls and a loaf of bread from Kristin and Daniel. Before we left Sturgis we stopped at a local pizza shop with an awesome Italian flag painted interior and great pizza! I’ve never seen such a unique paint job at an Italian restaurant. The pizza from Piper’s was completely homemade. You could tell from the ultra-thick crust. We loved it. Jason loves tasting pizzas and root beers from family-owned small shops around Michigan. I think it’s something he has personally enjoyed the most in our travels. He should start a pizza blog.
City Sign:
We found the Sturgis city sign on East Chicago Street after a small hunt for it. It was a beautiful sign that reflected the city in its upkeep and uniqueness. The choice of font and different sizes of lettering was done really well. I liked the city lightning seal logo a lot. It was a very easy sign to park near and walk too. We’ve had our share of challenging city signs in the past. I included a few of our best water tower pictures in my city sign collage picture. We love trying to get epic jumping pictures in front of water towers. Will proved he has Jason’s skills in Sturgis by getting the most epic flying picture of the day.
Other Awesomeness:
Luke was the youngest runner at the Thurston Woods 5K. I was approached by a very nice woman named
Carol Holmes as we were walking back to use their restrooms that asked about
Luke. Carol is the Thurston Woods Risk
Management and Marking Director. Carol
asked if she could take a picture of Luke.
We ended up taking one by the Thurston Woods sign. She asked me why we had come to Sturgis and I
told her about my Michigan City Challenge.
She told me she would let the Sturgis Journal know about both Luke and I
and asked me for our names and my phone number.
I was really excited and kept my eye on the Sturgis Journal in the
following weeks. When the article came
out I was really surprised. Jason and I
had a good laugh reading,
“Also of note, according to Holmes, were Mandi Frye and her
son Luke Frye of Marshall. Mandi has been running at numerous events. Luke
was the youngest runner at Saturday’s event and finished the 5K.”
I was Mandi with an “I” and I ran in “numerous running events”….
As Tommy Boy would say….”Yikes!” I have
met a lot of runners in the last three years and a great many of those runners
have run in “numerous events.” We now
have a joke in our family that my first blip in a newspaper was “Mandy runs a
lot.” I don’t think saying I’ve ran in
numerous events makes me different than many runners I have met. I don’t know what was passed to the
journalist from the race director. I never
received a phone call from the Sturgis Journal.
I’m not upset about the article.
I’m more embarrassed because it doesn’t sound journal worthy to run in
numerous cities, at least to me. Luke being
the youngest runner was awesome. I am
glad he was mentioned in the article. I
was totally shocked that Thurston Woods raised over $18,000 for their residents
from the 5K. It totally blew my mind
reading that in the Sturgis Journal.
Luke did what’s beginning to look like his trademark move. He stayed behind me for a majority of the course
and blasted past me at the finish line.
I need to learn sprint finishes from him. He had an awesome run.
We went to Thurston Park after the run. It was a huge wooden park surrounded by large
trees that made it very shady. The kids
had a lot of fun there. All the kids went
out on Simon Says with my “Hold them to the sun” order. Jason got stuck in a tire swing. I ate our post-run food at the park. Luke tried to scare Jason behind a tree, but
Jason ended up coming up behind him.
After we left Thurston Park, we spent a lot of time back out in the
bright sun trying to get epic water tower still shots of us flying. It’s a new thing that is catching on with the
family. Luke carved a smiley face in his
apple before we officially left.
After visiting Sturgis we decided (since we were only two miles
from the Indiana border) we would go to Shipshewana for the rest of the afternoon. The kids and I had never been there
before. Jason remembers getting amazing
pretzels as a kid in Shipshewana. Sturgis
was only 24 minutes from Shipshewana. We
stopped at Ben’s Soft Pretzels and the pretzels were great, but Jason doesn’t
think Ben’s was the same place he went to as a kid. I got some goat milk hair spray and soap at Ben’s
Soft Pretzels. We stopped in a few
stores to look around and saw some amazing things. I would love to get Amish made furniture in the
future. We have an Amish table that’s
been in our family for over 40 years. The
quality is unmatched. Of course we loved
seeing all the horse and buggies on the roads.
We were not expecting to see a huge motorcycle convoy come through town
as we were pulling out of a shop. It was
awesome and very large! They had police
cars in front and behind them.
We found shaved ice at a garage sale in Indiana that was amazing! They had a “shaved ice” flag and made the
kids HUGE shaved ice that they loved. I
bought the kids each a keychain from the sale; a jelly bean man, pumpkin with a
cat inside and purple spider. Ryan didn’t
believe we were so close to Indiana so we made a bet on how long it would take
to get there. I said under 5 minutes.
Ryan was shocked when he saw the “Welcome to Indiana” sign and we got it
on camera.
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