Save the date: 2019 Skyway 10K will be run March 3

The inaugural Skyway 10K was a resounding success, organizers announced Tuesday, raising $560,000 for the Armed Forces Families Foundation.

The 2019 race will be run on Sunday, March 3.

Event director Brian Horne said that 8,000 runners will make the 6.1-mile crossing from the south to north sides of the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, an increase of 500 over the first year.

It was one of several changes developed with hindsight, operations director Kelly Kresel said at a press conference at Tropicana Field, the staging area on race day (runners are bussed from the baseball stadium to the south side of the bridge). “With the increase in field size (number of runners), we’ll increase the waves (numbers of runners running at a single time) to lessen the congestion on the bridge.

“We’ve increased coordination with the City of St. Petersburg Police Department and Tampa Bay Rays to improve parking flow on race morning.”

Registration will begin “later this summer,” she added. Registration for the inaugural run – which sold out – was  $75.

Early on Tuesday, Horne said, Florida governor Rick Scott “reached out and offered to create a five-year agreement for the Skyway 10K.” St. Pete city officials, he added, have pledged their support to the five-year plan.

In 2018, Horne and his team worked with 13 state, local and federal agencies. The Sunshine Skyway, as part of the country’s interstate highway system, comes under several jurisdictions.

“I think the reason this worked is that 100 percent of every dollar goes back to the Armed Forces Families Foundation,” he said before trhe inaugural run. “There was just an overwhelming support to see if we could pull this thing together.”

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