Bird Competes in Last Annual Vol State Race
Friends and family were on hand to greet Matthew Bird, Friday morning as he makes a stop in Lexington, during the Last Annual Vol State Race. He had already traveled almost 90 miles on foot.
Photo by: Steve Corlew / The Lexington Progress
Article by Steve Corlew-
Lexington’s Matthew Bird is running a marathon. But it is not your average foot race. The Last Annual Vol State race takes runners from the Mississippi River near Hickman County, KY to the top of Sand Mountain in Georgia. Much of the 314-mile journey is through Tennessee.
The race also brought Bird right through his hometown of Lexington. Bird is one of 113 runners competing in the unique race, which began Thursday, July 14.
Bird was greeted by friends and relatives at his rest stop just north of Hall Street in Lexington on Friday morning.
Runners came through Henderson County, down Tennessee 22, and then through U.S. 412, into Decatur County.
A check on Bird’s progress as of Tuesday morning, showed him among the top 10 runners in the event. He was past Tracy City, TN about 30 miles from the finish.
Three runners had finished the course by Monday, Johan Steene of Sweden, John Wright of Oregon, and Peter Strickland of Georgia.
As of Tuesday morning, 20 runners had dropped out of the race. Runners were from across the United States, two from Sweden, five from Canada, one each from Japan and Great Britain.
For this and other interesting articles, see the July 20th edition of The Lexington Progress.
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