Peoria’s premiere road race is back for its 51st year with a rebrand and a designation bringing elite athletes to the starting line in downtown.
The Steamboat Classic will be the USA Track and Field (USATF) 4 Mile Open Road Race National Championship site. Race Director Adam White announced the designation at a press conference Monday morning. He says it involved a lengthy bid process.
“So we will be working with the USATF to assemble a field of approximately 40 men and 40 women who are some of our country’s best road runner track racers, you know, and they will be racing for a national championship,” said White.
White says the race’s numbers suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic, limiting the reach of the race, and never quite recovering the previous number of “elite participants.” He hopes this display of the country’s fastest runners brings more spectators and participants out to this year’s event.
“We are seeing our men and women run times at distances that they’ve never run in our country’s history,” White said. “And we as a country are more competitive than we’ve ever been at all distances.”
The national championship is just one part of a wide rebrand White says the race committee has worked extensively on for the last six months. With the rebrand comes a new logo, a commitment to year-round campaign events like fun runs and a year-long theme honoring the achievements of women in running.
Jenna Wiesner, Client and Community Relations Director with Steamboat sponsor PNC Bank, says the theme is centered around Peoria native Bev Enslow. Enslow ran in all 50 previous Steamboat Classics.
Wiesner listed some of Enslow’s other athletic accomplishments, including 12 school records at Western Illinois University, champion of the Quad Cities’ Bix Seven in 1981 and participation in the Chicago Marathon, New York Marathon and the California International Marathon.
“We look forward to hearing more about Bev’s story throughout the year, with the hope that it inspires all of us to evaluate how we can focus on our physical wellness, healthy living and those [athletic] friendships,” said Wiesner.
A final notable change to the Steamboat Classic’s 51st year is a new pay-what-you-can registration option. White says registration fees are necessary for promoting and planning races, but the minimum $40 cost excludes a chunk of the community.
“The beauty of running has always been that anybody can do it, right?” he said. “It doesn’t take much.”
White says the race is a less than perfect community event if it isn’t accessible for everyone in the community.
“Then the best way to do it is to not have them apply, to have it baked into the actual registration process in such a way that doesn’t force that man, woman, that child, to have to come to the table on bended knee and ask for a handout. Trust them to register on their own and to put in whatever amount they can truly afford to give,” he said.
White says the “scholarship” fund is entirely donation-based. Building up the fund starts with a donation from White’s own business RC Outfitters of $3,000. White hopes future donations provide at least another $3,000, which he says would be enough funding for up to 150 people to sign up at no cost.
The Steamboat Classic 4 Mile and 15k Races are Saturday, June 14. Registration starts on Saturday, Feb. 1 here.
