(Emilee Chinn/Getty Images)
By Hanna Park
(NEW YORK) New York Road Runners, which hosts the New York City Marathon, announced Thursday the return of its first regularly scheduled race since the beginning of the pandemic.
On June 12, the club will hold its New York Mini 10K, or the 10-kilometer, women-only race held annually since 1972, with the exception of last year, The New York Times reports.
“This is our first real table setting,” said Kerin Hempel, the organization’s interim chief executive. “It’s starting to feel like ‘OK, we’re back, we’re coming back.’”
The Mini 10K race will be smaller than in previous years, with a cap of 1,200 runners. The race will also follow safety protocols, such as requiring runners to wear masks at the start and finish line. Participants will be strongly encouraged to wear masks during the race.
It will be the first time NYRR welcomes elite athletes since the 2019 New York City Marathon, with 25 elite athletes expected at the starting line, including Sara Hall, the 2019 Mini 10K champion.
The organization has held a series of “return to racing” events since the onset of the pandemic. Hempel said those events had given NYRR the confidence to move ahead with its first regularly scheduled race since March 2020.
“We’ve been saying the marathon is going to happen,” she said. “It’s more about what it’s going to look like and how many people we can accommodate on the course.”