Sundance Racing Festival to sashay through Rehoboth Aug. 25
Rehoboth Beach is home to the popular Sundance Racing Festival, which will take off at 8 a.m., Sunday, Aug. 25, at the Bandstand in the Nation’s Summer Capital. I thought I would preview the event and try to give runners and biathletes as much information as possible as they head into the event. Remember you can always go to www.seashorestriders.com for more race details.
The Sundance event, nicknamed the Sundance Land & Sea, celebrates its 10th year with a swim/run biathlon, 5K run, half-mile swim, and one-mile fun walk or sashay. Sundance is a racing festival with several events and distances for all ages, shapes, sizes and genders. Proceeds will also support the CAMP Rehoboth Community Center.
Whether you’re a serious runner, swimmer, a power walker or want to dress like a diva and sashay away, there will be something for everyone. This event will also feature a catwalk where creativity and costumes are encouraged, and prizes will be awarded in several categories. Be creative and prepared to sashay! Sundance also offers a sleepwalker category where one can remain in bed sleeping and still donate to the cause.
The race committee decided months ago to celebrate the 10th anniversary with a 30-by-60-inch beach towel instead of the traditional race T-shirts. Race registration will be at the Bandstand from 7 to 7:50 a.m., and the race will start at Rehoboth Avenue and the Boardwalk.
One of the event highlights is always the great afterparty that will be held at CAMP Rehoboth Community Center, 37 Baltimore Ave.
Avoid the Sunday morning rush and pick up your packet Saturday from 5 to 6 p.m. at the Rehoboth Beach Recreation Office at Grove Park, 509 Rehoboth Ave.
Sundance offers free parking on race morning until 10 a.m.
Wetsuits are allowed and optional if water temperature is 78 degrees or lower on race morning. If wearing a wetsuit, remember to mark your bib number on a head cap.
Lifeguards reserve the right to remove any athlete from the race. This removal will result in a DNF.
For just $5, Sundance lets you bring a guest to enjoy the food and festivities at the afterparty. Custom-designed, handcrafted wood trophies for costume awards, middle of the pack award, and team award were made by Linda Stanley. Middle of the pack means whoever comes in exactly in the middle of the 5K pack wins this award. Good luck to all runners! Sundance is one of the few events where Gatorade-colored water is at the finish line.
Sashay categories presenting awards include: best individual costume male and female, best individual costume male and female child, and best team costume. Overall, masters, and first place in age groups will receive steel awards custom-made and brought to you by Paul and Becky Montini from Advanced Sheet Metal.
Hundley takes over Indian River XC
Bethany Beach event director and businessman Rick Hundley will take over as head coach of the Indian River cross country team. Runner Andy White will be his assistant. The Indians have some talented runners in the district, as they pull from Selbyville to Fenwick Island on the southeast corner up through Bethany and Ocean View, and over to Dagsboro and Frankford. I have known both coaches for a long time, and a few years ago, I had the pleasure to coach against these two while they were at Selbyville and I was at Beacon. And boy, did we have some great middle school meets.
The Selbyville and Beacon girls’ teams produced performances that were better than most high school programs, as we both broke 1:50 in the 4-by-200-meter relay, ranking both teams in the top 10 nationally. Hundley’s teams were the best ones I competed against, and he always pushed us to earn that W. Indian River will be a much-improved team in my prediction and may surprise some of the larger D1 teams in the Henlopen Conference. The Indians may not be the most talented and they may not win them all, but they will be highly motivated, and any team Rick Hundley is coaching, as any of my teams as well, will go into every meet thinking, believing and planning to come out with the win. Good luck to Rick, Andy and the Indians this season.
Cross country update
The Henlopen Conference has gone to a south versus south and north versus north plan for the season schedule with the logic of reducing the number of dual meets. I get what the powers that be were trying to do, but it leaves a very weak south schedule competing against each other. When you have a decent south team that wants to get better, they have to race against the best teams like CR, Smyrna, Polytech, Cape and Dover. I would have elected a quad meet that happens every other week with a host of invitationals open to all on Fridays and Saturdays. Some of the meets in the south just should not take place, as some teams in the past have had only a handful of runners and not even enough to score. Maybe if a team cannot field five runners, they should just compete in the invitationals, county, conference and states. Just a thought.
