HAVRE, Mont. (NMB) – After plans for the first Bear Paw Marathon were scrapped last summer due to COVID-19 concerns, the Havre Area Chamber of Commerce is preparing to give it another go.
Executive Director Julea Robbins says they are cautiously moving forward with new plans to hold the inaugural Bear Paw Marathon on June 5th, but it will be a bit different than the traditional marathon.
“We are going to have both an in-person race and a virtual participation option, which is pretty awesome. So if people are not comfortable participating in-person they can just participate virtually. They will get all the same swag, and the same recognition, which is really cool.”
The in-person race is currently be restricted to Montana residents only, and additional COVID-19 precautions will be in place. As for the virtual race option, Robbins provides a description of what that will look like.
“So you sign up just like you would for a regular marathon, half marathon, whatever you want to run. You just sign up on our website, and we send you all the information of how you report on where you’re running. But you can run anywhere. You can run on the streets, you can run on the treadmill. We will have little fun routes mapped out in Havre if someone wants to go out and run those. They will not be not manned, of course, you can run them whenever you want to. Just to get people out and about in the community. You can run anywhere you want and just report back to us on how far you ran, what your time was, and then we send out your medal and your shirt.”
There will be a full marathon, a half marathon, and a 5k. The routes will be nearly identical to what it was supposed to look like last year, with the full marathon beginning in Beaver Creek Park and ending in Havre.
Registrations will open up later this month, and more details will be unveiled in the coming weeks and months.
If COVID-19 case rates rise in the area in the lead up to the Marathon, Robbins says they have contingency plans to hold the entire event virtually.
