Downtown Yakima Mile ready to run down Yakima Avenue on July 2
Available prize purse $45,000-plus including time and record bonus money
YAKIMA, Wash. — Make the 2022 Downtown Yakima Mile part of your Fourth of July weekend festivities! This year’s race will be held on Saturday, July 2, and will feature heats for kids, families, veterans, professional runners and more; walkers and dogs are welcome too.
The Downtown Yakima Mile, a Bring Back the Mile Featured Event, is much more than a race. It’s about bringing our community together for fun, fitness, and in support of important causes that serve our friends and neighbors in the Yakima Valley. Through the generosity of race sponsors Home2 Suites and Tru by Hilton-Yakima Airport, the Downtown Yakima Mile is free for runners 18 & under. Senior citizens are $12.50, and all other runners can register for $25.
Yakima’s only downtown community fitness event challenges both individuals and our community to come together on a day when everybody wins and records may fall. The race again supports Yakima’s YWCA, whose motto is “eliminating racism; empowering women.”
The Yakima Mile’s elite heats draw NCAA champions, USA champions and Olympians to the Yakima Valley. Last year, Nikki Hiltz charged away in the final two blocks to record the fastest women’s Mile on Washington state soil, clocking 4 minutes, 21.50 seconds and earning a $5000 bonus. The men’s race featured three-time Olympian Matthew Centrowitz, who won a 1500 meter gold medal in Rio 2016, the first U.S. runner to win the event since 1908. However, former Oregon All-American Sam Prakel out sprinted the competiton and held off 2019 runner-up Tripp Hurt by less than a second. Prakel crossed the finish line in 3 minutes, 54.9 seconds, and like Hiltz, took home $5000 as race champion.
At the inaugural Downtown Yakima Mile in 2019, the fastest men’s Mile on Washington soil of 3 minutes, 51.79 seconds was run by Amos Bartelsmeyer of Germany.
The Downtown Yakima Mile Committee is delighted to offer more than $45,000 in prize and bonus money across competitive and pro races. Our goal is to provide a healthy community event open to everyone, highlighting and celebrating the Yakima Valley on a local, regional and national scale.The event Yakima Mile inspires families across the Yakima Valley and beyond to become and stay active.
Hogback Development Company, producer of The Downtown Yakima Mile, seeks to shed light on the invaluable services provided by this year’s beneficiary, the YWCA Yakima. The YWCA touches the lives of thousands of people here in the valley through its 24-hour domestic violence emergency shelter, crisis hotline, affordable housing aid, legal advocacy and more.
By participating in the Downtown Yakima Mile, the community can help provide the YWCA with the resources to help every family in need. Learn more about the YWCA’s life-saving services at ywcayakima.org.
Run for fun. Run for health. Run for the record. Run to show your community spirit. Run to support survivors of domestic abuse.
To register for the race or find out more, go to: yakimamile.com
