Part of the post-race checklist for Atlanta Track Club executive director Rich Kenah has been to call participants in the AJC Peachtree Road Race who were taken to area hospitals.
The job took longer than normal — Kenah said that 36 runners were taken to area hospitals, most because of the oppressive heat and humidity that enveloped the event. As of Tuesday afternoon, he said he had spoken with the vast majority of the 36, and everyone he had spoken to had been discharged. Nine runners were transported to Grady Memorial Hospital, but none were admitted, spokeswoman Lindsay Caulfield said.
Kenah said it was the highest number of transportations for the race in recent years. From his perspective, given the conditions that challenged the field of almost 60,000 and even staggered the elite runners, it could have been higher.
“To only have 36 transportations, that’s a pretty incredible number,” Kenah said.
Last year, when the race was run in the rain, 18 participants were evaluated to be transported, but only five were sent to a hospital. Other years have been comparable. In 2011, though, the race began under red caution, and 28 were taken to hospitals.
The start-time temperature of 73 degrees was the hottest since 2011. Monday’s race began under yellow conditions (use caution) and moved to red (dangerous conditions) around 8:30 a.m., 40 minutes before the last time group crossed the starting line. Kenah said there were no conversations to raise the alert level to black (event cancelled).
“I’m overall very pleased with the quality of the medical care that the medical team provided at the medical tents we had in Piedmont Park,” Kenah said.
According to National Weather Service data, the temperature at 8:53 a.m. at Fulton County Airport-Brown Field was 78 degrees with 82 percent humidity and a heat index of 80 degrees. By 9:53, when much of the field was still making its way to Piedmont Park, the temperature was 83, humidity was 70 percent and the heat index was 88.
Kenah said that race staff and volunteers prepared for the impact of the extreme conditions and worked to raise awareness to participants in days leading to the race. Tex McIver, who ran his 44th consecutive Peachtree on Monday, described the conditions as “moderately bad,” but not the worst he could remember. He praised race officials for putting emergency medical personnel on bicycles on the race course, the first time he had seen that implemented.
“When you get that heat beating down on you with no clouds, you’re sitting there generating a lot of heat yourself with your activity, it’s not a good formula,” he said.
