Color Run bringing messy fun back to riverfront
It’s known as the happiest 5K on the planet and with good reason. The Color Run — a unique paint race that celebrates healthiness, happiness and individuality — will be back in Windsor for the sixth straight year on Sept. 1 at the Riverfront Festival Plaza. Running Flat race director Chris Uszynski has produced the Color Run for a number of years and this year licensed it for all of Canada, which means he’ll be offering the race in Windsor, Toronto, Montreal and Sherbrooke.
“I just felt the Color Run is too important of an event experience, especially in the endurance field, to disregard,” he said. “You think about how you can get four to five thousand people who have never been in a race before and you are able to get them all on a 5-kilometre course and make it super fun, super loud and super messy.” In fact, the first year the Color Run came to Windsor the anticipation for the loud paint-throwing, race was so big that nearly 16,000 people participated. Those numbers have since dropped, but it still attracts around 5,000 people, making it one of the largest runs in Ontario. It has attracted close to 6 million runners in 35 countries over the years.
“I have a much different view as a race director of how I think people get introduced to our sport,” Uszynski said. “But I think it’s through great and high-end experiences that they go, ‘Wow, I’ll do that again.’ ”
The Color Run typically attracts non-competitive or new runners along with families looking to do an event together. For new runners, the race often kick-starts them into the sport and, for some, it’s an incentive to sign up for other races. Uszynski said the key to keeping runners interested is making the race relevant, fresh and exciting year after year. This year is the Hero Tour, which means people can put on a cape and dress up as their favourite superhero. “I think what makes it so profoundly fun, is it’s so profoundly messy,” he said. “It brings you back to your childhood and when you could go out and get really, really dirty.”
For more information, check out runningflat.com