Weekend festivities in Mount Pulaski features food and fun
Enthusiasm for first King of the Hill 5K

 

[July 21, 2018] 

MOUNT PULASKI 

Fresh off the previous weekend’s July 4th fireworks, which drew a large crowd and rave reviews on Saturday, July 7th, Mount Pulaski residents continued to party it up with the Vinegar Hill 2nd Friday Market Days and Street Fest on July 13th.

In a completely unrelated event, but one that had perfect timing, a King of the Hill 5K Race took place on the Hilltop Saturday evening and gave folks a chance to run off any over indulgence of food and beverage from the night before.

About Friday night’s food and fun

Doug Johnson, a spokesperson for the Mount Pulaski Business Association said the group aims to get people to the square on Friday nights and give them a chance to visit with their neighbors. The organization’s goal is to make the second Friday of the month a family fun night with vendors, food, music and children’s activities.

“We are going to do a few summer nights on Friday night and build up to the Fall Festival,” said Johnson. “We are getting our vendors lined up and our music lined up, so the Fall Festival will be the grand finale of the summer.”

The event on the town square July 13th featured vendors selling metal artwork, jewelry, clothing and crafts, as well as food vendors such as Lantz BBQ with their delicious pulled pork nachos and smoked hotdogs, the local Boy Scout Troop 122 with their famous pork chop sandwiches and Gramma Nana’s Kitchen with a variety of desserts, notably freshly baked hot cookies served right from the bright yellow food truck. Gramma Nana’s Kitchen is also famous for their homemade ice cream sandwiches.

The Hilltop Club set up a stand with children’s activities and free popsicles. For the bigger kids, basketball hoops were set up on the square in front of Pizza Man.

Later in the evening, Joe Stamm of the Joe Stamm Band played an acoustic set on a trailer set up in front of Lucky Lager. Stamm hails from Metamora and his band is a high energy country rock group that has opened for Jamey Johnson, Travis Tritt and the Kentucky Headhunters, just to name a few. This unplugged evening with Stamm himself performing solo featured the budding artist performing top country hits as well as some of his original material.

The next 2nd Friday Market Days and Street Fest will be Friday, August 10th. The event begins at 5 p.m. on the square with Washington and Cooke Streets being blocked off for the crowds. The vendors are open for business until 8 p.m. Music will typically start around 7 p.m. and play until 10 p.m.

Saturday night’s alright for fitness

On Saturday evening Zach Switzer of Mount Pulaski organized a King of the Hill 5K to benefit Abe’s Million (Mount Pulaski Courthouse Foundation) and despite the threat of bad weather, the race went off without a hitch.

The race began at 6 p.m. at the bottom of Washington Street by Johnson True Value Hardware Store and quickly headed uphill. Not long into the race, Mother Nature dumped rain on the runners and the volunteers. Still, many smiling faces ran up and down the hills of Mount Pulaski and when it was all said and done, the soaked runners were smiling at the finish line.

Switzer, who rode along the race course on his bicycle was both happy and relieved at the completion of the King of the Hill 5K.

“For the first year, I think it was a success,” said Switzer. “We had a lot of runners show up to race no matter what Mother Nature was going to do. The DPCM Time Bounty was met on both the men’s and women’s with amazing times. This couldn’t have been done without all of our sponsors.” Cash prizes were awarded to the bounty winners.

The King of the Hill 5K winner Bryan Glass (center) is surrounded by Amanda Nelson and Jacob Albert

Bryan Glass of Springfield finished first overall with a time of 16:45. Amanda Nelson of Springfield was the first female winner with a time of 20:45. Jacob Albert was the third runner to cross the finish line with a time of 21:52.

Approximately 30 runners ran the King of the Hill 5K in this, its first year. Many of the runners were from Springfield, Decatur and Lincoln. There were several positive comments about the race afterwards. Many of the runners liked the idea of an evening race. Everyone really seemed to enjoy running up and down the hills of Mount Pulaski. One runner was overheard saying, “I really didn’t know Mount Pulaski was so hilly.”

And the rain did nothing to dampen the spirits of the runners. One runner commented, “I started my day at a 5K in Metamora and it was raining and I ended my day in Mount Pulaski at a 5K and it was raining. It’s great. The weather here is perfect tonight,” the man said, with a big grin.

Another group of runners who were walking from the finish line in front of the courthouse entrance on Washington Street to the post-race party at the Old Brickyard Pub and Grill on Lafayette Street, commented how smoothly run the race was and they, too, agreed the rain was a perfect touch to the evening. Despite finishing soggy, the rain had cooled the runners off a bit.

A couple from McLean ran the race with their baby in a stroller and as they were changing the baby into dry clothes out of the back of their van following the race, they, too, were full of nice comments. They thought the race course was laid out beautifully and they didn’t hesitate to say they would return to Mount Pulaski to run this race again. All this while they were both still dripping wet.

This brings up the question, why is it that runners are so determined to run, even when they know rain and possibly a storm is coming?

Phillip Goode, Abby Coers and Carrie Schonauer are just some of the wet and happy runners who completed the King of the Hill 5K.

Local runner Abby Coers of Lincoln offered her thoughts on this issue. “Runners are very stubborn individuals when we have a goal in mind,” said Coers. “Not many obstacles will hold us back. Runners go through a lot of struggles in life from making time to train and giving up a lot of our social life to physical injuries, and emotionally and mentally being able to get ourselves through the run, short or long distance. Just last week I got home at 5:15, changed into running clothes, ran and got back in by 6:15, to quickly look decent and be in a meeting by 6:30. That’s the things people don’t see. No, sometimes we don’t have time to run. But we squeeze it in. People see us running and excited to be at races because that is our happy moments. But in training there are a lot of painful moments to get us to be the runners we want to be. Things like speed workouts, running up and down hills, long runs that could last for hours. It’s also an individual sport for the most part. It’s a sport of self-discipline and moving towards our own individual goals.”

There is no doubt it takes determination to be a runner. “It’s fun for us,” added Coers. “The weather added an extra adrenaline rush boost.” Coers was also happy that this Mount Pulaski race offered a “crazy amount of challenging hills.” The true mindset of a runner with a lot of positivity sprinkled in the mix.

Meanwhile, Switzer is already looking forward to planning the event next year. Based on the many positive comments about not only the race, but also the medals, awards, t-shirts and drink tokens given away for the post-race party, the King of the Hill 5K will most likely grow in participants.

Back to that grand finale of the summer Doug Johnson mentioned earlier. The 2018 Mount Pulaski Fall Festival will be the weekend of September 14 and 15. September 14 will be the final Vinegar Hill 2nd Friday Market Days and Street Fest of the summer. The event will coincide with the Fall Festival and hopes to draw an even larger crowd to Mount Pulaski.

[Teena Lowery]