Eau Claire Marathon goes virtual

The Eau Claire Marathon was originally scheduled to be ran Sunday throughout downtown Eau Claire.

But, due to the Coronavirus, the race has now been rescheduled for September. In an effort to keep the running community involved, race director Emi Uelmen said the race has turned the marathon into a virtual event for the first time. People encouraged to run their selected distance before May 31, then post to social media through the Eau Claire Marathon app with a virtual finish-line and medal. She said that the response from people has been incredible.

“We all had to get creative in the running world to figure out ways to still be there for each other, give the virtual high five, still try and push a runner on from 6-feet away,” Uelmen said. “We have almost 400 people signed up to run virtually with us. Some of them are people that can't run with us in September, so they changed their registration to run virtually with us this month.”

Pat Toutant is the assistant race director for the Eau Claire Marathon. He said they wanted to have this virtual event, because running a marathon is a big accomplishment.

"Many people had set their training schedule to run today," he said. "They wanted to accomplish that and this gives them the opportunity to do it by themselves, but yet have a little bit of support and enthusiasm. "

Registration for the virtual event closes Monday at midnight, so there is still time to sign up. If you're interested in signing up,