Northern Kentucky has hills. Cincinnati has hills.
Wherever you run in the area, you will finds hills — small inclines across the bridges and in the downtowns of Covington and Newport; long, gentle rises into the suburbs; short, steep slopes on many of the side streets, and rolling hills throughout the rest of the area.
So, if you’re going to do a race, you need to run up hills. And what better way to do that than run a race that is all uphill?
That would be the Straight Street Hill Climb, an unusual, if not unique, run up one of the steepest streets in Cincinnati.
“I’m sure there’s something like it elsewhere, but I don’t know where,” said race director Doug Newberry
Billed as “one of the most grueling sub-mile runs on the planet,” the race takes place annually on the Sunday before Thanksgiving up Straight Street in Cincinnati’s Clifton neighborhood. It’s a short race — just a little more than a third of a mile. But it’s grueling — it rises some 228 feet over that span, a 12 percent grade. For most runners, it will take 2½ to 5 minutes to complete.
The goal every year is for someone to break the two-minute mark, which has never been done. The record, Newberry said, is 2:01. The winner last year ran it in 2:26.
“I run the Straight Street Hill Climb because it’s different, and an interesting challenge,” said Mike Jepson. “I really enjoy unique running events to give my running a little diversity. … It’s a great event which every runner should run at least once.”
The Clifton Track Club started the race in 1976, and it’s been held more or less every year since then. A few years ago, a bicycle race was added. The foot race begins at 9 a.m., with the bike race starting about half-hour later.
Newberry first ran the race sometime in the 1980s. (“It was absolutely miserable,” he said.) Then one of his brothers, then another, took over as race director, until it became his turn. He’s now in his ninth or 10th year as head overseer.
“It’s been around for so long now, it’s got its own stigma,” he said. “We like to play it up as a two-minute mini-marathon, because it takes as much effort to run as it does to run a marathon.”
Straight Street is a short street that runs from West McMicken Avenue to Clifton Avenue. The race part stops at the crest of the hill at University Circle.
To run the race, you actually meet at the top of the hill and walk down to the starting line. The walk is vertigo-inducing, and it seems much, much longer than a tad over a third of a mile.
Then you wait at the bottom until a guy drives down, beeps his horn for the start, and off you go.
It costs 10 bucks. And people line up to run it. Newberry said he expect 100 runners this year, depending on the weather, which is expected to be cold and cloudy. Some people run it year after year after year. Others see it as a bucket-list item, he said: They run it once and never return.
Chris Dennemann of Florence, who runs with the group Run NKy, said he’s planning to sign up “for the challenge and because I like hills. They make you stronger.”
Jeff Napier of Cincinnati also cited the challenge “and the cold beer at the top of the hill.” Eric Kavalauskas of Edgewood said he’s looking forward to the “three minutes of brutality.” Nurys Diaz of Cincinnati is running it for the first time “because I like challenges, and I always wanted to do it.” Paul Seibert of Fort Mitchell, who finished the race last year in 3:16, said he runs it “because it’s there.”
I run it, said Emily Leising of Independence, “because nothing says ‘I have no idea why I force myself to suffer’ like sprinting up Straight Street. … I like random distances and different races.”
Paul Long writes weekly for the NKyTribune about running and runners. For his daily running stories, follow him at dailymile.com or on Twitter @Pogue57