This past Sunday, a 5k race was held as a tribute to Lance Corporal Matthew Rodriguez and was held in Fairhaven, MA. Matthew Rodruguez’s sister, Laura, held this race in honor of her brother who died in combat in Afghanistan. The race was held to honor the American military and act as a venue to encourage many veterans to participate and run. Before the start of the race, Laura dedicated the race to her family and friends who help sponsored the race and stated that she wants to fundraise for veterans and the armed forces. She stated that if any runners want to stop by her home to pay tribute to her family, then they have the option of doing so, but that she does stated that if you want to win, then keep pushing ahead.
After she was done speaking, her brother sang the anthem of the marines and the national anthem. After that, the runners said the pledge of allegiance to show patriotism to their America and praises to soldiers fighting abroad for our freedom. Eventually, the race started and the runners spirited down the start line. There were police cars echoing sirens telling onlookers that runners will be coming out and watch where you were going. Even though this was race, traffic wasn’t stopped and runners still had to scan the streets.
The runners ran straight up the course and turned right to go straight ahead out of the park and then turned left onto Church Street. After running onto Church Street, they turned at the second right and ran straight ahead and onto the first mile mark. Many people wearing orange and police officers were guiding the runners so that they don’t lose course. After running past the one mile mark, they took a right onto Bridge Street and kept going. Soon at the first right they took that turn and there was a water station. Many of the runners had different ideas on how to deal with station, some didn’t take the water, others slowed down and drank a cup, whilst many took the cup and ran.
After the two mile mark, they took a left on Center Street and then they took a right on Pleasant Street and finally a left onto Church Street back to where they started. Once they went past Laurel Street and sprinted all the way straight down onto the street where the started the race. There was one runner who was about to caught up, but the guy in front of him sprinted all the way down the finish line. At the end of the race, Laura’s sister, Lisa, gave out participation medallions to everyone who finished the race. The race was spectacular and many people were cheering on everyone who crossed and those who finished had water and bananas as refreshment after the race.
Laura announced the winners of the race which were first place male, female, male student, female student, male veteran, and female veteran. The student winner was Shane McNamara even though he finished first with a time of 18:19 and won the race, but he was under 16, so he won male student student. The female student was Ashley Schepis who finished 25:41, male winner was Jason Foster who finished 18:37, female winner was Angela Mott who finished 24:49. The male veteran was Christopher Cutter who finished 21:03 while female veteran was Andrea Vieira who finished 24:49. After the race, there was a barbecue at the New Bedford airport, but you had to pay in order to get a spot there, all in all this was a great 5k.