March 8, 2025
March 8th found us near the banks of the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, for the 4th annual Redz River Run. It was 65 degrees, overcast, and cheerful as people gathered in front of A. W. Mumford Stadium on the campus of Southern University, home of the Jaguars. A local event run by a local group, the energy of familiar people greeting each other at a gathering filled the air. 70s dance music tumbled out of the PA system, and people made sure it served its purpose. A fitness instructor led a large-group pre-race warmup. An emcee kept it all going. All this before the race even started.
The event was put on by the Baton Rouge Sigma Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority and benefited the Baton Rouge Aids Society, Southern Laboratory School, Exxon YMCA, Ainsley’s Angels, and The Butterfly Society.
This was the latest of our 5Ks that were part of multi-race events that also included a 10K. But it was the first that also included a Dear Dash. The Dear Dash was a brisk 20-yard walk for people 60 years of age or older. We’ve run a number of races that included a kids dash, but we had yet to see one that focused on the opposite end of the age curve.
The Dear Dash field skewed well older than its 60-years-old threshold, as many of the younger senior citizens who could do the 5K did so. In fact, 48 people 60-years-old and older ran the 5K – including an 80-year-old, and an 87-year-old who finished in the top 25% of all 5K runners. This left a Dear Dash field of senior senior citizens who may not have 3.1 miles of walking or running in them, but could amble the distance of two first-downs. And they brought their fire with them. They scooted those twenty yards like they meant it.
The race field included a group of Ainsley’s Angels. Ainsley’s Angels pairs people whose disabilities prevent them from racing on their own with runners who push them in customized race wheelchairs. Ainsley’s Angels are named in honor of Ainsley Rossiter, who as a three-year-old was diagnosed with Infantile Neuroaxonal Dystrophy (INAD), an extremely rare terminal illness that slowly causes global paralysis. Ainsley’s parents pushed her in a local road race when she was five years old and discovered that she loved it. This led to the family using running as a group activity and as a means of bringing Ainsley joy. Ainsley’s Angels of America was formed to keep Ainsley’s memory alive and to bring the joy of road racing to other children with disabilities. Two rows of Ainsley’s Angels teams led the field, lining up at the front of the pack and starting two minutes ahead of the rest of the runners.
The course ran through and around the Southern University campus on mostly flat roads with some gradual rises and downslopes. There was one short rise that made us work a bit and one short downslope that gave us a small boost, but nothing that qualified as a serious hill.
The top three finishers crossed the line in under twenty minutes, with the winner coming in at 18:45 – a 6:02 per mile pace. The top female finisher came in at 21:58 – a 7:05 pace – and finished 7th overall.
Julie had another medal finish, finishing 2nd of 55 in her age group. She came in 10th of 208 females and 34th of 279 overall.
Ryan earned some hardware as well, finishing 1st of 14 in his age group. He came in 7th of 66 males and 8th of 279 overall.
As with some other races on our trip, the organizers used the event as an opportunity to promote a larger mission. A mini-fair was set up with groups promoting various causes. Staffed tables provided information on maternal and neonatal health, kidney health, mosquito control, drug addiction, Alzheimer’s research, heart health, and more. We talked with the people staffing a number of the tables, who were all friendly, informative, and eager to share about their issue of focus. And they had swag. We walked away with water bottles, cups, keychains, string bags, and more – and even had our blood pressure and oxygen levels checked. While not the first post-race info fair we’ve seen, this one had a Louisiana twist – free jambalaya for the runners. That’s not our normal 9:00 AM snack, but it sure did hit the spot.
Detailed Race Report for Running Nerds
We both had a great time at our Louisiana run.
Ryan had been finding, race after race, that he continued to loosen up and find his stride and he lined up at the front of the crowd at the starting line. That tells you what kind of race he was planning on having. And he delivered. Finishing in 22:19, he delivered one of his fastest races of the trip. Rather than starting out with a goal to run below 8 minute miles, this time, he started off with his sights set higher right from the word go. He started his run with the goal to keep it below 7:30 for the duration. He delivered on this with a 7:23 for miles one and two. Unfortunately, these don’t quite qualify as negative splits as his second mile was about 6/10’s of a second slower than his first. Well, he more than made up for that on mile 3, when he picked up the pace and delivered a 6:49, his fastest mile of the trip. Julie’s prediction that he would break 22 minutes by California has proved wrong…but she is still holding onto the belief that he will cross that barrier before the trip is over. He felt solid and strong the whole time, feeling the pain of working hard, but never dipping into the pain where you just wish it was all over. He has settled into a strong and consistent base.
Julie, on the other hand, settled into something else after our Florida race. She ran the middle 20+ races of the trip with a “recovery” mindset, hoping that, by the last 10 states, she could start to really race again. That strategy seemed to be looking good as she eased into a naturally increasing speed and base of fitness as we approached the last ten races. She started to feel some real strength and speed as we headed into our South Carolina race. She picked up the pace for that race, not running anywhere close to her max speed, but slowly starting to move in that direction. She had hoped that would be something she could build on each race. After lots of gluttonous food choices in Florida, Julie was not surprised to find that, even though she felt the muscle fitness, her overall feeling in that race had been the “dragging a pile of bricks behind you” type – that being the official term of course. After Florida’s race, she shifted her mindset again. She would treat it as one race on and then a handful of races back into recovery mode until she felt that break back into strength and recovery. That isn’t what she wanted it to be, but she felt glad to be in tune with her body. When Julie reached the starting line of our Louisiana race, her plan was to jog an easy 9:45 mile 1. If that mile felt, in fact, easy, she would pick it up to 9:30 in mile 2. And, if that mile felt easy, she’d let herself race in mile 3. If mile 1 didn’t feel easy, then she’d run an easy 9:45ish with gentle negative splits for the duration. It turned out to be the latter. Though Julie wasn’t psyched to feel a sense of difficulty at a speed that she would usually feel she could easily run forever, she was very happy that she had come into the race with a real understanding of where her body was at and was able to run the race that matched that. She ended up running a very similar overall race to Florida’s race, except this one was on purpose.
At the end of the race, she had plenty of juice for a kick and was just about to engage it when a cheerful man pushing a stroller whizzed by her. Julie cheered him on and he did the same back to Julie. Julie was in a quandary. She wanted to kick, but she did not like the idea of clobbering a cheerful man pushing a baby stroller. Why not, she thought to herself? A race is a race and not racing would be pandering. She continued to think. But, it just didn’t feel sportsman like, for whatever reason. But she also didn’t want to sacrifice the joy of the kick. So, she decided to split the difference and picked up the pace to be right next to him on the final stretch. “Want to race?” She asked him with a smile? He smiled right back and the race was on. Julie and her counterpart and a stroller picked up the pace to a sprint, neck and neck down the home stretch, and the crowd was loving it. At the same time as it was fun and the gentleman gave her a real run for her money, there was also the timing pad at the finish line and all parties were equally concerned about that baby flying right out of that stroller at these speeds. Julie and the man both slowed down right before the race timing pad. Julie could not take advantage of that for a win, and the man slid over the finish line just before her.
It was good times had by all.
R and J in the USA 
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