The hubs, Mary, and I did Breathe Deep Atlanta this weekend, a 5k Walk/Run on the Georgia Tech campus, benefiting the lung cancer research through the LUNGevity Foundation. This was a very different experience than the Firefly Run, and not just because it was during the day.

This is a small run with a lot of heart, organized by a small, dedicated group of people. The run is in its fourth year, but this year was the first we’d heard of it – though it was also probably the first year we cared about running at all, so perhaps we just missed it.

The weather was beautiful, the volunteers were happy and friendly, a ton of snacks and water bottles available, and there was a DJ ensuring that a lot of peppy music was blaring out across the quad during registration, when we picked up our seemingly requisite free t-shirts. At registration, you could get a large sticker to wear with your number to put the names of loved ones affected by or lost to lung cancer, which I thought was really touching. Just prior to the run, we were led in a warm-up routine by an awesomely enthusiastic aerobics instructor.

We all assumed that the race would be on the Pi Mile, but the route was different. Different, but good. The “halfway” point (it was more than halfway) was at the bottom of Freshman Hill, which seemed like an awful idea in the moment, but running back up the hill was probably my best portion of the race.

A bunch of people brought their kids and dogs; this is a race that is clearly more about the cause than about competition. In that vein, there were no D-tags to time you. Based on the clock at the finish line, I finished in about 36 minutes, about the same as Firefly (which is amazing, considering I haven’t been training too hard, and was kind of sore).

My one complaint about race was inconsistent traffic control. In some places, the route was closed to traffic – either because it was a pedestrian area, or there were cops keeping it clear. In some areas, the cops were letting cars through, and in some areas there didn’t seem to be any traffic control at all. There’s all kinds of ways to have a race, but to me the inconsistency seemed potentially dangerous. I saw people running in the middle of the road, because they thought the route was closed, only to have a car come up behind them. But the cars were going slow, so it doesn’t seem that any harm was done.

After the race, we got swag bags with beer openers, koozies and the like, as well a post-race juice boxes, toasty crackers, and other snackies. All in all a good time, and a very feel-good experience. $15 a person to help out lung cancer research (and more if you could get friends and family to sponsor your run), and a nice fall run. I recommend this race, and I think we’ll be running it again next year.