These colours do run

You might remember a few weeks back I mentioned in one of these blogs that I went and watched an event here in Austin called the Electric Run; a 5km race for charity after dark where everyone is wearing lights and glow sticks, there’s music and then a big party at the end. It turns out there are similar events to this almost every weekend.

Yesterday was the Colour Run. And this time I was taking part.

These things take place out at the Austin rodeo and carnival grounds. So after waking up at some un godly time in the morning, and after queuing for an hour to get in, we were met by a sea of 15,000 people in white T-shirts. Everyone had received a pack before the race containing race No. etc and a white colour run T-shirt and a pack of paint powder. There was only one rule: You start clean, and end up dirty!!!

A strong influence on the event is the Hindu festival Holi which celebrates the end of winter and the start of spring. It also removes some of the social boundaries between age, class and sex, everyone gets together to celebrate and have fun. This is something that definitely carries over into the Colour Run. There were people running from the ages of 1 – 85, and what better way than to disguise someone’s wealth, culture or upbringing than by having everyone where the same cloths and be covered in paint?

Every kilometre there is a different colour station where volunteers cover race goers in more paint, and they certainly don’t hold back. After the orange station everyone looked like the guy from the 90s Tango advert (I thought about slapping Graham in the face and shouting ‘You know when you’ve been Tango’d’ but I didn’t think anyone would understand and I might end up being tackled by a police officer, so I resisted), and when was the last time you saw a bright blue 70 year old?

At the end, there is another party around a dance stage where everyone opens their paint packets and the ground, the air, everything, descends into a rainbow of colour, movement and fun.

The tag line for the event is ‘The Happiest 5k run in the World’ and I can’t imagine there is one that can beat it. The atmosphere was great, everyone was having a good time and the more colourful you were the happier you became.

So I was thinking, why doesn’t Exeter do something like this? You have the location out at Westpoint, a large student population that would get behind it, and a strong local running community that would support it as well. Plus, it’s great fun!!! So I’m going to look into this when I get back and see if we can’t make this happen for next year. So if you think this is a good idea, want to help or know of anyone that could help me get this off the ground then let me know.

I’ll see you all next year then with your t-shirts and paint in hand.

Until next time…

This week I have been listening to…