Ever dreamed about running across home plate at Fenway Park as the crowd cheers you on? Want to be a part of an unforgettable fundraising event that will help provide much needed services to local veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan? Well, do we have the race for you! The …
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Ever dreamed about running across home plate at Fenway Park as the crowd cheers you on? Want to be a part of an unforgettable fundraising event that will help provide much needed services to local veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan?
Well, do we have the race for you! The Run to Home Base presented by RTX is a unique fundraising event through scenic Boston ending with the unforgettable experience of finishing the race by literally crossing home plate at historic Fenway Park. Friends and family can watch you from the stands at Fenway, with food, entertainment and fun family activities available in the concourses of America’s Most Beloved Ballpark.
The Run to Home Base presented by Raytheon Technologies will honor our nation’s heroic veterans and help raise much needed funds for the Red Sox Foundation and Massachusetts General Hospital Home Base Program. This outreach will serve the many veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with combat stress and/or traumatic brain injury and their families.
Runners participating in the Run will have timed chips in their bibs recording their race time as they cross the finish line in front of Fenway’s iconic Green Monster. Registered runners will proceed along the warning track by the visitor’s dugout for a “photo finish” where each runner will be photographed crossing home plate. All registered runners are eligible for a free photo to be distributed via the web.
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Great race for a great cause!
Runners gather inside Fenway for the opening ceremony. This years ceremony went long, about thirty minutes past the scheduled time. (But it was moving and gave a lot of background … MORE
Runners gather inside Fenway for the opening ceremony. This years ceremony went long, about thirty minutes past the scheduled time. (But it was moving and gave a lot of background on Home Base, highlighting veterans, caregivers, and the corporate sponsors). Plenty of restrooms available during that time and then two on the 9k course.
A Different Way to Experience Fenway
This is a 5K or 9K race at Fenway Park that raises money for mental health services for veterans. It is a really cool event that goes to a great … MORE
This is a 5K or 9K race at Fenway Park that raises money for mental health services for veterans. It is a really cool event that goes to a great cause. However you do need to raise $500 to participate so if you aren’t great at fundraising you may be paying a lot for the race. There was good pre-race communication with a good number of emails. There was packet pick-up either Friday or Saturday. I would have loved more options for packet pick-up as I would have been able to pick it up Wednesday or Thursday but was not available Friday but as they had race day packet pick-up it was not a big deal. For the race I parked on the outskirts of Boston and took the subway to to Fenway since I didn’t feel like dealing with parking at Fenway. This worked fine but then you have to either carry or wear the swag since there is no bag check. Everything race day morning was very organized. I got my bib and swag. Swag includes a very nice tech shirt and a baseball hat. Since there was no bag check I just wore them for the race. One thing kind of annoying is the race starts at 8am but there is an hour long pre-race ceremony and bib pick-up needs to be done before the ceremony so unless you live in Boston you need to wake up really early. After bib pick-up we sat in the stands for the ceremony. Don’t get me wrong it was a very nice and moving ceremony. It just meant an early morning. I did leave the ceremony a few minutes early to use the bathroom and stretch and walked to the start line and got a selfie with Wally the Red Sox mascot. The ceremony also went a bit long so the race started a bit late which is my only production complaint. There was a big start corral. The 9K went first, then 5K runners, then 5K walkers. It was a big but not huge race with a few thousand runners in each category. The course was very nice and mostly flat. It was a T-shaped with the first approximately 1 mile through Boston than you ran along a Bridge to Cambridge and ran about 1 mile out and back to the right and a little under a mile out and back to the left and then ran back to Fenway. The section in Cambridge had beautiful views of the city. The weather was perfect this morning. I was still extra slow from the lung issues I was having. I was do run-walk intervals at about 14 to 15 minute miles. One thing a bit disappointing for me is there were not a lot of 9Kers doing this pace. If you are around this pace you may want to do the 5K if you like to be around other participants. There were a lot of people doing my usual 12 to 13 minute mile pace so as long as air pollution isn’t the new normal this shouldn’t be an issue for me most years. There were plenty of aid stations. There was one just about every mile. Also very well-marked and streets were all closed off. You finish by running into Fenway and it is really cool to see Fenway from inside the field. My finishing time was slow but as I expected with my lungs and since 9K is a weird distance I did PR lol! I will admit the actual running through home base was a bit anticlimactic. After you finish the participants line up and walk over home base. Since there was a baseball game later the base was covered all around so it could be used for the game. They also gave out water and some snacks at the end. Overall I thought this was a really fun race and a cool way to see Boston and get a different perspective at Fenway. As long as you don’t mind raising the $500 and don’t mind getting up early I would recommend this race. I’m not sure I’d make it an annual race due to those 2 factors but I would definitely consider doing it again.